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List of wine-producing regions

Wines are produced in significant growing regions where vineyards are planted. Wine grapes mostly grow between the 30th and the 50th degree of latitude, in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, typically in regions of Mediterranean climate. Grapes will sometimes grow beyond this range, thus minor amounts of wine are made in some rather unexpected places.

In 2021, the five largest producers of wine in the world were, in order, Italy, France, Spain, the United States, and China.

Countries
Top wine-producing countries and their volume of wine production for the year 2021 in tonnes, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), which is an agency of the United Nations; this is the latest information available from the FAO.

Their data show a total worldwide production of 27 million tonnes of wine with the top 15 producing countries accounting for over 90% of the total.

Algeria

 * Algiers
 * Béjaïa
 * Chlef Province
 * Dahra
 * Mascara
 * Médéa
 * Tlemcen
 * Zaccar

Cape Verde

 * Chã das Caldeiras

Morocco

 * Atlas Mountains
 * Benslimane
 * Meknès

South Africa

 * Breede River Valley
 * Constantia
 * Durbanville
 * Elgin
 * Elim
 * Franschhoek
 * Little Karoo
 * Orange River Valley
 * Paarl
 * Robertson
 * Stellenbosch
 * Swartland
 * Tulbagh

Tunisia

 * Arianah
 * Nabul
 * Sousse

Argentina

 * Buenos Aires Province
 * Médanos
 * Catamarca Province
 * La Rioja Province
 * Mendoza Province
 * Neuquén Province
 * Río Negro Province
 * Salta Province
 * San Juan Province

Bolivia

 * Tarija Department

Brazil

 * Bahia
 * Curaçá
 * Irecê
 * Juazeiro
 * Mato Grosso
 * Nova Mutum
 * Minas Gerais
 * Andradas
 * Caldas
 * Pirapora
 * Santa Rita de Caldas
 * Paraná
 * Bandeirantes
 * Marialva
 * Maringá
 * Rosário do Avaí
 * Pernambuco
 * Casa Nova
 * Petrolina
 * Santa Maria da Boa Vista
 * Rio Grande do Sul
 * Bento Gonçalves
 * Caxias do Sul
 * Cotiporã
 * Farroupilha
 * Flores da Cunha
 * Garibaldi
 * Pinto Bandeira
 * Santa Catarina
 * Pinheiro Preto
 * São Joaquim
 * Tangará
 * São Paulo
 * Jundiaí
 * São Roque

Canada

 * British Columbia
 * Fraser Valley (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Gulf Islands (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Okanagan Valley (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Similkameen Valley (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Thompson Valley (wine region) (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Vancouver Island (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Nova Scotia
 * Annapolis Valley
 * Ontario
 * Lake Erie North Shore and Pelee Island (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Niagara Peninsula (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Prince Edward County (VQA defined viticultural area)
 * Toronto
 * Quebec
 * Eastern Townships

Colombia

 * Villa de Leyva
 * Valle del Cauca
 * La Unión

Costa Rica

 * Valle Central
 * Santa Ana
 * La Garita
 * Dota
 * Copey de Dota

Chile

 * Aconcagua
 * Aconcagua Valley
 * Casablanca Valley
 * Atacama
 * Copiapó Valley
 * Huasco Valley
 * Central Valley
 * Cachapoal Valley
 * Maipo Valley
 * Mataquito Valley
 * Maule Valley
 * Coquimbo
 * Choapa Valley
 * Elqui Valley
 * Limarí
 * Pica – a wine-producing oasis before the Chilenization of Tarapacá
 * Southern Chile
 * Bío-Bío Valley
 * Itata Valley
 * Malleco Valley
 * Bueno Valley and Ranco Lake

Mexico

 * Aguascalientes
 * Aguascalientes Valley
 * Baja California
 * Valle de Guadalupe
 * Valle de Calafia
 * Valle de Mexicali
 * Valle de San Vicente
 * Valle de Santo Tomás
 * Zona Tecate
 * Coahuila / Durango, collectively known as La Laguna wine region
 * Valle de Parras
 * Guanajuato
 * Guanajuato City
 * San Miguel de Allende
 * Dolores Hidalgo
 * San Felipe
 * Salvatierra
 * San Francisco del Rincón
 * Hidalgo
 * Nuevo León
 * Valle de Las Maravillas
 * Querétaro
 * Valle de Tequisquiapan
 * Sonora
 * Caborca
 * Hermosillo
 * Zacatecas
 * Valle de las Arcinas

Peru

 * Arequipa region valleys
 * Huaral District and Cañete Province – both in Lima Region; formerly in Surco were vineyards that have disappeared due to urban expansion
 * Ica Region – including Chincha, Pisco and Ica valleys
 * Pica – a wine-producing oasis before the Chilenization of Tarapacá

United States

 * Arizona
 * California
 * Central Coast AVA
 * Livermore Valley AVA
 * Paso Robles AVA
 * York Mountain AVA
 * Central Valley
 * Lodi AVA
 * North Coast AVA
 * Mendocino AVA
 * Napa Valley AVA
 * Sonoma County
 * Sierra Foothills AVA
 * South Coast AVA
 * Colorado
 * Idaho
 * Michigan
 * Missouri
 * New Jersey
 * New Mexico
 * New York
 * Finger Lakes AVA
 * Hudson River Region AVA
 * Long Island AVA
 * Oregon
 * Willamette Valley AVA
 * Pennsylvania
 * Texas
 * Texas High Plains AVA
 * Texas Hill Country AVA
 * Trans-Pecos
 * Virginia
 * Washington
 * Columbia Valley AVA

Uruguay

 * Montevideo
 * Canelones
 * Maldonado
 * Garzón
 * José Ignacio
 * Colonia
 * San José

Venezuela

 * The wine-producing enterprise for Venezuela can be found here.

 * Carora, Lara State

Albania

 * Berat
 * Korça
 * Leskovik
 * Lezhë
 * Përmet
 * Shkoder
 * Tirana County

Austria

 * Burgenland
 * Northeastern and eastern Lower Austria
 * Kamptal
 * Kremstal
 * Wachau
 * Wagram
 * Weinviertel
 * Southern Styria
 * Vienna and surrounding area

Belgium

 * Côtes de Sambre et Meuse, between the rivers Sambre et Meuse, since 2004
 * Hagelandse wijn, near Rotselaar/Leuven, since 1997
 * Haspengouw, Limburg, since 2000
 * Heuvelland, since 2005

Bosnia and Herzegovina

 * Čapljina
 * Čitluk
 * Ljubuški
 * Međugorje
 * Mostar
 * Stolac
 * Trebinje

Bulgaria

 * Black Sea region
 * Danubian Plain
 * Rose Valley
 * Thrace
 * Valley of the Struma River

Croatia

 * Continental Croatia: Central Croatia and Slavonia
 * Moslavina
 * Plešivica
 * Podunavlje
 * Pokuplje
 * Prigorje – Bilogora
 * Slavonia
 * Zagorje – Međimurje
 * Littoral Croatia: Northern Croatian Littoral and Dalmatia
 * Croatian Coast (Hrvatsko primorje)
 * Dalmatian Interior (Dalmatinska zagora)
 * Central and South Dalmatia (Srednja i Južna Dalmacija)
 * Northern Dalmatia (Sjeverna Dalmacija)
 * Istria (Istra)

Cyprus

 * Commandaria
 * Laona – Akamas
 * Vouni Panagias – Ambelitis
 * Krasochoria Lemesou
 * Pitsilia
 * Diarizos Valley

Czech Republic

 * Moravia
 * Mikulov – Mikulovska wine
 * Slovácko
 * Velké Pavlovice
 * Znojmo
 * Bohemia
 * Litoměřice
 * Mělník
 * Prague
 * Gazebo at Gröbe's Villa
 * St. Clare's
 * St. Wenceslas' Vineyard at Prague castle
 * Salabka, Troja

France

 * Alsace – Alsace wine
 * Bordeaux – Bordeaux wine
 * Barsac
 * Entre-Deux-Mers
 * Fronsac
 * Graves
 * Haut-Médoc
 * Margaux
 * Médoc
 * Pauillac
 * Pessac-Léognan
 * Pomerol
 * Saint-Émilion
 * Saint-Estèphe
 * Saint-Julien
 * Sauternes – Sauternes
 * Burgundy (Bourgogne) – Burgundy wine
 * Beaujolais
 * Bugey
 * Chablis
 * Côte Chalonnaise
 * Côte d'Or
 * Côte de Beaune
 * Aloxe-Corton
 * Auxey-Duresses
 * Beaune
 * Chassagne-Montrachet
 * Meursault
 * Santenay
 * Côte de Nuits
 * Chambolle-Musigny
 * Gevrey-Chambertin
 * Nuits-Saint-Georges
 * Vosne-Romanée
 * Mâconnais
 * Pouilly-Fuissé
 * Champagne – Champagne
 * Corsica
 * Ajaccio
 * Cap Course
 * Patrimonio
 * Vin de Corse
 * Calvi
 * Figari
 * Porto-Vecchio
 * Sartène
 * Jura – Jura wine
 * Languedoc-Roussillon
 * Banyuls
 * Blanquette de Limoux
 * Cabardès
 * Collioure
 * Corbières
 * Côtes du Roussillon
 * Fitou
 * Maury
 * Minervois
 * Rivesaltes
 * Loire Valley – Loire Valley (wine region)
 * Anjou – Saumur
 * Cognac
 * Muscadet
 * Pouilly-Fumé
 * Sancerre
 * Touraine
 * Lorraine
 * Madiran
 * Provence
 * Rhône – Rhône wine
 * Beaumes-de-Venise
 * Château-Grillet
 * Châteauneuf-du-Pape
 * Condrieu
 * Cornas
 * Côte du Rhône-Villages, Rhône wine
 * Côte-Rôtie
 * Côtes du Rhône
 * Crozes-Hermitage
 * Gigondas
 * Hermitage
 * St. Joseph
 * Saint-Péray
 * Vacqueyras
 * Savoy

Georgia

 * Abkhazia
 * Kakheti, containing the micro-regions Telavi and Kvareli
 * Kartli
 * Imereti
 * Racha-Lechkhumi and Kvemo Svaneti

Germany

 * Ahr
 * Baden
 * Franconia (Franken)
 * Hessische Bergstraße
 * Mittelrhein
 * Mosel
 * Nahe
 * Palatinate (Pfalz)
 * Rheingau
 * Rheinhessen
 * Saale-Unstrut
 * Saxony (Sachsen)
 * Württemberg

Greece

 * Aegean islands
 * Crete
 * Limnos
 * Paros
 * Rhodes
 * Samos
 * Santorini
 * Central Greece
 * Attica
 * Epirus
 * Zitsa
 * Thessaly
 * Nea Anchialos
 * Rapsani
 * Ionian Islands
 * Kefalonia
 * Macedonia
 * Amyntaion
 * Goumenissa
 * Naousa, Imathia
 * Peloponnesus
 * Mantineia
 * Nemea
 * Patras

Hungary

 * Balaton
 * Badacsony
 * Balaton-felvidék
 * Balatonboglár
 * Balatonfüred-Csopak
 * Nagy-Somló
 * Zala
 * Duna
 * Csongrád
 * Hajós-Baja
 * Kunság
 * Eger
 * Bükk
 * Eger
 * Észak-Dunántúl
 * Etyek-Buda
 * Mátra
 * Mór
 * Neszmély
 * Pannonhalma
 * Pannon
 * Pécs
 * Szekszárd
 * Tolna
 * Villány
 * Sopron
 * Tokaj

Ireland

 * Cork

Italy

 * Apulia
 * Bianco di Locorotondo e Martina Franca
 * Primitivo di Manduria
 * Calabria
 * Bivongi
 * Cirò
 * Gaglioppo
 * Greco di Bianco
 * Lamezia
 * Melissa
 * Sant'Anna di Isola Capo Rizzuto
 * Savuto
 * Scavigna
 * Terre di Cosenza
 * Campania
 * Avellino
 * Aglianico
 * Falanghina
 * Fiano
 * Greco di Tufo
 * Benevento
 * Aglianico
 * Falanghina
 * Solopaca
 * Caserta
 * Napoli
 * Salerno
 * Emilia-Romagna
 * Colli Cesenate
 * Sangiovese Superiore di Romagna
 * Trebbiano di Romagna
 * Liguria
 * Cinque Terre
 * Lombardy
 * Franciacorta
 * Oltrepo Pavese
 * Marche
 * Castelli di Jesi
 * Conero
 * Piceno
 * Piedmont
 * Acqui
 * Alba
 * Asti
 * Barolo
 * Colli Tortonesi
 * Gattinara
 * Gavi
 * Ghemme
 * Langhe
 * Monferrato
 * Nizza
 * Ovada
 * Sardinia
 * Cagliari
 * Cannonau
 * Monti
 * Nuragus
 * Ogliastra
 * Vermentino di Gallura
 * Sicily
 * Etna
 * Noto
 * Pantelleria
 * Trentino-Alto Adige
 * South Tyrol, known alternatively as Südtirol (in German) or Alto Adige (in Italian)
 * Trentino
 * Tuscany
 * Bolgheri
 * Chianti
 * Chianti Classico
 * Colli Apuani
 * Colli Etruria Centrale
 * Colline Lucchesi
 * Elba
 * Montalcino
 * Montescudaio
 * Parrina
 * Pitigliano
 * San Gimignano
 * Scansano
 * Val di Chiana
 * Val di Cornia
 * Valdinievole
 * Valle di Arbia
 * Umbria
 * Montefalco
 * Orvieto
 * Torgiano
 * Veneto
 * Arcole
 * Bagnoli
 * Bardolino
 * Bianco di Custoza
 * Breganze
 * Colli Berici
 * Colli di Conegliano
 * Colli Euganei
 * Gambellara
 * Garda
 * Lessini Durello
 * Lison Pramaggiore
 * Lugana
 * Montgello e Colli Asolani
 * Piave
 * Prosecco
 * Soave
 * Valdadige
 * Valpolicella

Latvia

 * Sabile

Lithuania

 * Anykščių vynas – Anykščiai
 * Mėmelio vynas – Priekulė

Luxembourg

 * Moselle Valley

Moldova

 * Bardar
 * Codri
 * Cricova
 * Hîncești
 * Purcari

Montenegro

 * Crmnica
 * Plantaže, near Podgorica

Netherlands

 * Groesbeek

North Macedonia

 * Povardarie
 * Skopsko vinogorje
 * Tikveš

Norway

 * Mostly Viken and Vestfold og Telemark
 * Sognefjord

Poland

 * Dolny Śląsk
 * Kazimierz Dolny
 * Małopolska
 * Podkarpacie
 * Warka, near Warsaw
 * Zielona Góra

Portugal

 * Alentejo
 * Bairrada
 * Bucelas
 * Carcavelos
 * Colares
 * Dão
 * Lagoa
 * Lagos
 * Madeira
 * Portimão
 * Porto e Douro
 * Setúbal
 * Tavira
 * Vinhos Verdes

Romania

 * Banat wine regions:
 * Arad
 * Jamu Mare
 * Măderat
 * Miniș
 * Moldova Nouă
 * Recaș
 * Silagiu
 * Teremia
 * Tirol

 * Crișana wine regions:
 * Diosig
 * Săcuieni
 * Sâniob
 * Sanislău
 * Valea lui Mihai

 * Dobrogea wine regions:
 * Adamclisi
 * Aliman
 * Babadag
 * Băneasa
 * Cernavodă
 * Chirnogeni
 * Dăeni
 * Hârșova
 * Istria
 * Măcin
 * Medgidia
 * Murfatlar
 * Oltina
 * Ostrov, Constanța
 * Ostrov, Tulcea
 * Poarta Albă
 * Sarica-Niculițel
 * Simioc
 * Tulcea
 * Valea Dacilor
 * Valea Nucarilor
 * Valu lui Traian

 * Moldavia wine regions:
 * Berești
 * Bohotin
 * Cotești
 * Colinele Tutovei
 * Comarna
 * Copou
 * Corod
 * Cotnari
 * Covurlui
 * Cucuteni
 * Dealu Morii
 * Dealul Bujorului
 * Hârlău
 * Hlipicani
 * Huși
 * Iași
 * Ivești
 * Jariștea
 * Nămoloasa
 * Nicorești
 * Odobești
 * Panciu
 * Păunești
 * Probota
 * Tănăsoaia
 * Târgu Frumos
 * Tecuci
 * Țifești
 * Tomești
 * Vaslui
 * Zeletin

 * Muntenia wine regions:
 * Seciu
 * Breaza
 * Cricov
 * Dealu Mare
 * Dealurile Buzăului
 * Pietroasa
 * Râmnicu Sărat
 * Șercaia
 * Ștefănești
 * Tohani
 * Topoloveni
 * Urlați–Ceptura
 * Valea Călugărească
 * Valea Mare
 * Zărnești
 * Zorești

 * Oltenia wine regions:
 * Banu Mărăcine
 * Calafat
 * Cetate
 * Corcova
 * Dăbuleni
 * Dealul Viilor
 * Dealurile Craiovei
 * Drăgășani
 * Golul Drincei
 * Greaca
 * Iancu Jianu
 * Izvoarele
 * Orevița
 * Plaiurile Drâncei
 * Plenița
 * Podgoria Dacilor
 * Podgoria Severinului
 * Poiana Mare
 * Potelu
 * Sadova-Corabia
 * Sâmburești
 * Segarcea
 * Tâmburești
 * Vânju Mare
 * Zimnicea

 * Transylvania wine regions:
 * Aiud
 * Alba Iulia
 * Bistrița
 * Blaj
 * Ighiu
 * Jidvei
 * Lechința
 * Mediaș
 * Șamșud
 * Sebeș-Apold
 * Șimleu Silvaniei
 * Târnave
 * Târnăveni
 * Teaca
 * Triteni
 * Valea Nirajului

Russia

 * Caucasus
 * Krasnodar
 * Stavropol

Serbia

 * Banat region

 * Nišava – South Morava region
 * Pocerina region
 * Srem region
 * Subotica – Horgoš region
 * Šumadija – Great Morava region
 * Timok Valley
 * West Morava region

Slovakia

 * Malokarpatská (Small Carpathians)
 * Južnoslovenská (Southern Slovakia)
 * Nitrianska (region of Nitra)
 * Stredoslovenská (Central Slovakia)
 * Tokaj (Tokaj region of Slovakia)
 * Východoslovenská (Eastern Slovakia)
 * The whole of southern Slovakia

Slovenia

 * Podravje
 * Posavje
 * Primorska

Spain

 * Andalusia
 * Condado de Huelva
 * Jerez-Xeres-Sherry
 * Málaga and Sierras de Málaga
 * Manzanilla de Sanlúcar de Barrameda
 * Montilla-Moriles
 * Aragon
 * Calatayud
 * Campo de Borja
 * Campo de Cariñena
 * Cava
 * Somontano
 * Balearic Islands
 * Binissalem-Mallorca
 * Plà i Llevant (DO)
 * Basque Country
 * Alavan Txakoli
 * Biscayan Txakoli
 * Cava
 * Getaria Txakoli
 * Rioja (Alavesa)
 * Canary Islands
 * Abona
 * El Hierro (DO)
 * Gran Canaria (DO)
 * La Gomera (DO)
 * La Palma (DO)
 * Lanzarote (DO)
 * Tacoronte-Acentejo
 * Valle de Güímar
 * Valle de la Orotava
 * Ycoden-Daute-Isora
 * Castile and León
 * Arlanza
 * Arribes del Duero
 * Bierzo
 * Cava
 * Cigales
 * Espumosos de Castilla y León
 * Ribera del Duero
 * Rueda
 * Tierra del Vino de Zamora
 * Toro
 * Valles de Benavente
 * Tierra de León
 * Valtiendas
 * Vino de la Tierra Castilla y León
 * Castile–La Mancha
 * Almansa
 * Dominio de Valdepusa
 * Guijoso
 * Jumilla
 * La Mancha
 * Manchuela
 * Méntrida
 * Mondéjar
 * Ribera del Júcar
 * Valdepeñas
 * Catalonia
 * Alella
 * Catalunya
 * Cava
 * Conca de Barberà
 * Costers del Segre
 * Empordà
 * Montsant
 * Penedès
 * Pla de Bages
 * Priorat
 * Tarragona
 * Terra Alta
 * Extremadura
 * Cava
 * Ribera del Guadiana
 * Galicia
 * Monterrei
 * Rías Baixas
 * Ribeira Sacra
 * Ribeiro
 * Valdeorras
 * La Rioja
 * Cava
 * Rioja (DOCa)
 * Community of Madrid
 * Vinos de Madrid
 * Región de Murcia
 * Bullas
 * Jumilla
 * Yecla
 * Navarre
 * Cava
 * Navarra
 * Rioja
 * Valencian Community
 * Alicante
 * Cava
 * Utiel-Requena
 * Valencia

Sweden

 * Gutevin – Gotland

Switzerland

 * Aargau
 * Bern
 * Shores of Lake Biel
 * Shores of Lake Thun (Spiez / Oberhofen)
 * Freiburg
 * Geneva
 * Grisons
 * Neuchâtel
 * St. Gallen
 * Schaffhausen
 * Thurgau
 * Ticino
 * Valais
 * Vaud
 * La Côte
 * Lavaux
 * Zürich

Turkey

 * White wine grapes:
 * Altıntaş – Marmara region and Bozcaada
 * Beylerce – Bilecik area
 * Bornova Misketi – İzmir area
 * Emir – Nevşehir (Cappadocia) area
 * Hasandede – Ankara and central Anatolia
 * Narince – Tokat area
 * Rumi, Kabarcık, Dökülgen – Southeastern Anatolia region
 * Sultaniye – Aegean region
 * Yapıncak – Thracian region
 * Red wine grapes
 * Adakarası – Marmara region and Avşa Island
 * Boğazkere – Elazığ and Diyarbakır areas
 * Çalkarası – Çal, Denizli area
 * Dimrit – central Anatolia and eastern Aegean region
 * Horozkarası, Sergikarası – southeastern Anatolia region
 * Kalecik Karası – Ankara area
 * Karalahna – Tekirdağ region, Bozcaada
 * Karasakız, Kuntra – Çanakkale region
 * Öküzgözü – Elazığ area
 * Papazkarası – Kırklareli area

Ukraine
In Ukraine, at the present time there are seven administrative regions (provinces) in which the wine industry has developed. Given the favorable climatic location, the law of Ukraine allocated 15 winegrowing areas (macrozones), which are the basis for growing certain varieties of grapes, and 58 natural wine regions (microzones). These are located mainly in the following areas.

 * Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol – 6 macrozones with 12 microzones (69 wine grapes)
 * Kherson Oblast – 2 macrozones with 10 microzones (28 wine grapes)
 * Mykolaiv Oblast – 2 macrozones with 7 microzones (31 wine grapes)
 * Odesa Oblast – 3 macrozones with 16 microzones (42 wine grapes)
 * Zakarpattia Oblast – 1 macrozone with 12 microzones (24 wine grapes)
 * Zaporizhzhia Oblast – 1 macrozone with 1 microzone (5 wine grapes)

United Kingdom
In the UK, the area under vines is small, and whilst viticulture is not a major part of the rural economy, significant planting of new vines has occurred in the early 21st century. The greatest concentration of vineyards is found in the south east of England, in the counties of Hampshire, Kent, Surrey, and Sussex.

Armenia

 * Ararat Valley
 * Areni, in the Vayots Dzor Province
 * Ijevan, in the Tavush Province

Azerbaijan

 * Aghdam, Agdam District
 * Baku, capital
 * Ganja, Ganja-Basar zone in central Azerbaijan
 * Madrasa village of Shamakhi Rayon, from Madrasa, indigenous only to this region
 * Tovuz and Shamkir, northwestern Azerbaijan

Burma

 * Shan State

China
Regions producing native wines have been present since the Qin Dynasty, with wines being brought to China from Persia. Some of the more famous wine-producing regions are:
 * Chang'an
 * Gaochang
 * Luoyang
 * Qiuci
 * Yantai-Penglai

With the import of Western wine-making technologies, especially French technology, production of wines similar to modern French wine has begun in many parts of China with the direction of experienced French wine-makers; China is now the sixth largest producer of wine in the world. The following regions produce significant quality of wine:
 * Chang'an
 * Dalian, Liaoning
 * Tonghua, Jilin
 * Yantai, Shandong
 * Yibin, Sichuan
 * Zhangjiakou, Hebei

India

 * Nashik, Maharashtra
 * Bangalore, Karnataka
 * Vijayapura, Karnataka
 * Narayangaon
 * Pune, Maharashtra
 * Sangli, Maharashtra

Indonesia
Indonesia has been producing wine for over 18 years, with North Bali's vineyards producing three main grape varieties: the Belgia, the Alphonse Lavallee and the Probolinggo Biru. The main producer, Hatten Wines, has revolutionized the world of winemaking, with eight wines produced from these three varieties.
 * Bali

Iran
Prior to the Iranian Islamic Revolution of 1979, Iran was a producer of wine. While production has stopped, the vineyards continue to exist and their product has been diverted to non-alcoholic purposes.
 * Malayer
 * Shiraz
 * Takestan
 * Urmia
 * Qazvin
 * Quchan

Israel
Also includes wine regions in Israeli-occupied territories.
 * Galilee
 * Upper Galilee
 * Golan Heights
 * Judean Hills
 * Jerusalem
 * Bet Shemesh
 * Latrun
 * Mount Carmel
 * Rishon LeZion (wine production since 1886)

Japan

 * Yamanashi
 * Hokkaido
 * Nagano

South Korea

 * Anseong, Gyeonggi-do
 * Gimcheon, Gyeongsangbuk-do
 * Gyeongsan, Gyeongsangbuk-do
 * Yeongcheon, Gyeongsangbuk-do
 * Yeongdong, Chungcheongbuk-do

Lebanon

 * Bekaa Valley
 * Anjar
 * Chtoura
 * Rashaya
 * Zahlé
 * Mount Lebanon
 * Aley
 * Baabda
 * Beit Mery
 * Bhamdoun
 * Brummana
 * Byblos
 * Chouf
 * Keserwan District
 * North Governorate
 * Chekka
 * Ehden
 * Koura
 * Qadisha Valley
 * Tripoli
 * Zgharta
 * South Governorate
 * Jezzine
 * Marjayoun
 * Rmaich

Palestinian territories

 * Beit Jala
 * Hebron

Syria

 * Bloudan
 * Homs District
 * Jabal el Druze
 * Latakia
 * Sednaya
 * Syrian Golan
 * Tartous

Turkey

 * White wine grapes:
 * Altıntaş – Marmara region and Bozcaada
 * Beylerce – Bilecik area
 * Bornova Misketi – İzmir area
 * Emir – Nevşehir (Cappadocia) area
 * Hasandede – Ankara and central Anatolia
 * Narince – Tokat area
 * Rumi, Kabarcık, Dökülgen – Southeastern Anatolia region
 * Sultaniye – Aegean region
 * Yapıncak – Thracian region
 * Red wine grapes
 * Adakarası – Marmara region and Avşa Island
 * Boğazkere – Elazığ and Diyarbakır areas
 * Çalkarası – Çal, Denizli area
 * Dimrit – central Anatolia and eastern Aegean region
 * Horozkarası, Sergikarası – southeastern Anatolia region
 * Kalecik Karası – Ankara area
 * Karalahna – Tekirdağ region, Bozcaada
 * Karasakız, Kuntra – Çanakkale region
 * Öküzgözü – Elazığ area
 * Papazkarası – Kırklareli area

Vietnam

 * Da Lat

Australia
Geographic indications for Australian wine are governed by law. The geographic indication must indicate where the grapes are grown, irrespective of where the wine itself is made. A geographic indication may be "Australia", "South Eastern Australia", a state name, zone, region or subregion if defined.

The zones, regions and subregions in each state are listed below:

Australian Capital Territory

 * Canberra District wine region
 * Hall, Australian Capital Territory
 * Majura

New South Wales

 * Big Rivers
 * Murray Darling
 * Perricoota
 * Riverina
 * Swan Hill
 * Central Ranges
 * Cowra
 * Mudgee
 * Orange
 * Hunter Valley
 * Hunter
 * Broke Fordwich
 * Pokolbin
 * Upper Hunter Valley
 * Northern Rivers
 * Hastings River
 * Northern Tablelands
 * New England
 * South Coast
 * Shoalhaven Coast
 * Southern Highlands
 * Southern New South Wales
 * Canberra District (includes the northern part of the Australian Capital Territory)
 * Gundagai
 * Hilltops
 * Tumbarumba

Queensland

 * Granite Belt
 * South Burnett

South Australia
Adelaide Super Zone includes Mount Lofty Ranges, Fleurieu and Barossa wine zones.
 * Barossa
 * Barossa Valley
 * Eden Valley
 * High Eden
 * Far North
 * Southern Flinders Ranges
 * Fleurieu
 * Currency Creek
 * Kangaroo Island
 * Langhorne Creek
 * McLaren Vale
 * Southern Fleurieu
 * Limestone Coast
 * Coonawarra
 * Mount Benson
 * Mount Gambier
 * Padthaway
 * Robe
 * Wrattonbully
 * Lower Murray
 * Riverland
 * Mount Lofty Ranges
 * Adelaide Hills
 * Lenswood
 * Piccadilly Valley
 * Adelaide Plains
 * Clare Valley
 * The Peninsulas

Tasmania

 * Regions, no zones defined

 * Coal River
 * Derwent Valley
 * East Coast
 * North West
 * Pipers River
 * Southern
 * Tamar Valley

Victoria

 * Central Victoria
 * Bendigo
 * Goulburn Valley
 * Nagambie Lakes
 * Heathcote
 * Strathbogie Ranges
 * Upper Goulburn
 * Gippsland
 * North East Victoria
 * Alpine Valleys
 * Beechworth
 * Glenrowan
 * King Valley
 * Rutherglen
 * North West Victoria
 * Murray Darling
 * Swan Hill
 * Port Phillip
 * Geelong
 * Macedon Ranges
 * Mornington Peninsula
 * Sunbury
 * Yarra Valley
 * Western Victoria
 * Grampians
 * Henty
 * Pyrenees

Western Australia

 * Greater Perth
 * Peel
 * Perth Hills
 * Swan Valley
 * South Western Australia
 * Blackwood Valley
 * Geographe
 * Great Southern
 * Albany
 * Denmark
 * Frankland River
 * Mount Barker
 * Porongurup
 * Manjimup
 * Margaret River
 * Pemberton

New Zealand
GI stands for New Zealand Geographical Indication.

 * Auckland (GI)
 * Henderson
 * Kumeu (GI)
 * Matakana (GI)
 * Waiheke Island (GI)
 * Canterbury (GI)
 * North Canterbury (GI)
 * Waipara Valley (GI)
 * Central Otago (GI)
 * Bendigo
 * Bannockburn (GI)
 * Gibbston
 * Wānaka
 * Gisborne (GI)
 * Hawke's Bay (GI)
 * Central Hawke's Bay (GI)
 * Gimblett Gravels
 * Bridge Pa Triangle
 * Marlborough (GI)
 * Wairau Valley
 * Southern Valleys
 * Awatere Valley
 * Nelson (GI)
 * Northland (GI)
 * Waikato (Te Kauwhata)
 * Wairarapa (GI)
 * Martinborough (GI)
 * Gladstone (GI)
 * Waitaki Valley (GI)

title: List of wine-producing regions


text:
Museum

A museum is an institution dedicated to displaying and/or preserving culturally or scientifically significant objects. Many museums have exhibitions of these objects on public display, and some have private collections that are used by researchers and specialists. Museums host a much wider range of objects than a library, and usually focus on a specific theme, such as the arts, science, natural history or local history. Public museums that host exhibitions and interactive demonstrations are often tourist attractions, and many attract large numbers of visitors from outside their host country, with the most visited museums in the world attracting millions of visitors annually.

Since the establishment of the earliest known museum in ancient times, museums have been associated with academia and the preservation of rare items. Museums originated as private collections of interesting items, and not until much later did the emphasis on educating the public take root.

Etymology
The English word museum comes from Latin, and is pluralized as museums (or rarely, musea). It is originally from the Ancient Greek Μουσεῖον (mouseion), which denotes a place or temple dedicated to the muses (the patron divinities in Greek mythology of the arts), and hence was a building set apart for study and the arts, especially the Musaeum (institute) for philosophy and research at Alexandria, built under Ptolemy I Soter about 280 BC.

Purpose
The purpose of modern museums is to collect, preserve, interpret, and display objects of artistic, cultural, or scientific significance for the study and education of the public. To city leaders, an active museum community can be seen as a gauge of the cultural or economic health of a city, and a way to increase the sophistication of its inhabitants. To museum professionals, a museum might be seen as a way to educate the public about the museum's mission, such as civil rights or environmentalism. Museums are, above all, storehouses of knowledge. In 1829, James Smithson's bequest funding the Smithsonian Institution stated that he wanted to establish an institution "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge".

In the late 19th century, museums of natural history exemplified the scientific drive for classifying life and interpreting the world. Their purpose was to gather examples from each field of knowledge for research and display. Concurrently, as American colleges expanded during the 19th century, they also developed their own natural history collections to support the education of their students. By the last quarter of the 19th century, scientific research in universities was shifting toward biological research on a cellular level, and cutting-edge research moved from museums to university laboratories. While many large museums, such as the Smithsonian Institution, are still respected as research centers, research is no longer a main purpose of most museums. While there is an ongoing debate about the purposes of interpretation of a museum's collection, there has been a consistent mission to protect and preserve cultural artifacts for future generations. Much care, expertise, and expense is invested in preservation efforts to retard decomposition in aging documents, artifacts, artworks, and buildings. All museums display objects that are important to a culture. As historian Steven Conn writes, "To see the thing itself, with one's own eyes and in a public place, surrounded by other people having some version of the same experience, can be enchanting."

Museum purposes vary from institution to institution. Some favor education over conservation, or vice versa. For example, in the 1970s, the Canada Science and Technology Museum favored education over the preservation of their objects. They displayed objects as well as their functions. One exhibit featured a historical printing press that a staff member used for visitors to create museum memorabilia. Some museums seek to reach a wide audience, such as a national or state museum, while others have specific audiences, like the LDS Church History Museum or local history organizations. Generally speaking, museums collect objects of significance that comply with their mission statement for conservation and display. Apart from questions of provenance and conservation, museums take into consideration the former use and status of an object. Religious or holy objects, for instance, are handled according to cultural rules. Jewish objects that contain the name of God may not be discarded, but need to be buried.

Although most museums do not allow physical contact with the associated artifacts, there are some that are interactive and encourage a more hands-on approach. In 2009, Hampton Court Palace, a palace of Henry VIII, in England opened the council room to the general public to create an interactive environment for visitors. Rather than allowing visitors to handle 500-year-old objects, however, the museum created replicas, as well as replica costumes. The daily activities, historic clothing, and even temperature changes immerse the visitor in an impression of what Tudor life may have been.

Definitions
Major professional organizations from around the world offer some definitions as to what constitutes a museum, and their purpose. Common themes in all the definitions are public good and the care, preservation, and interpretation of collections. The International Council of Museums' current definition of a museum (adopted in 2022): "A museum is a not-for-profit, permanent institution in the service of society that researches, collects, conserves, interprets and exhibits tangible and intangible heritage. Open to the public, accessible and inclusive, museums foster diversity and sustainability. They operate and communicate ethically, professionally and with the participation of communities, offering varied experiences for education, enjoyment, reflection and knowledge sharing."

The Canadian Museums Association's definition: "A museum is a non-profit, permanent establishment, that does not exist primarily for the purpose of conducting temporary exhibitions and that is open to the public during regular hours and administered in the public interest for the purpose of conserving, preserving, studying, interpreting, assembling and exhibiting to the public for the instruction and enjoyment of the public, objects and specimens or educational and cultural value including artistic, scientific, historical and technological material."

The United Kingdom's Museums Association's definition: "Museums enable people to explore collections for inspiration, learning and enjoyment. They are institutions that collect, safeguard and make accessible artifacts and specimens, which they hold in trust for society."

While the American Alliance of Museums does not have such a definition, their list of accreditation criteria to participate in their Accreditation Program states a museum must: "Be a legally organized nonprofit institution or part of a nonprofit organization or government entity; Be essentially educational in nature; Have a formally stated and approved mission; Use and interpret objects or a site for the public presentation of regularly scheduled programs and exhibits; Have a formal and appropriate program of documentation, care, and use of collections or objects; Carry out the above functions primarily at a physical facility or site; Have been open to the public for at least two years; Be open to the public at least 1,000 hours a year; Have accessioned 80 percent of its permanent collection; Have at least one paid professional staff with museum knowledge and experience; Have a full-time director to whom authority is delegated for day-to-day operations; Have the financial resources sufficient to operate effectively; Demonstrate that it meets the Core Standards for Museums; Successfully complete the Core Documents Verification Program".

Additionally, there is a legal definition of museum in United States legislation authorizing the establishment of the Institute of Museum and Library Services: "Museum means a public, tribal, or private nonprofit institution which is organized on a permanent basis for essentially educational, cultural heritage, or aesthetic purposes and which, using a professional staff: Owns or uses tangible objects, either animate or inanimate; Cares for these objects; and Exhibits them to the general public on a regular basis" (Museum Services Act 1976).

Ancient
One of the oldest museums known is Ennigaldi-Nanna's museum, built by Princess Ennigaldi in modern Iraq at the end of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. The site dates from c. 530 BC, and contained artifacts from earlier Mesopotamian civilizations. Notably, a clay drum label—written in three languages—was found at the site, referencing the history and discovery of a museum item.

Ancient Greeks and Romans collected and displayed art and objects but perceived museums differently from modern day views. In the classical period the museums were the temples and their precincts which housed collections of votive offerings. Paintings and sculptures were displayed in gardens, forums, theaters, and bathhouses. In the ancient past there was little differentiation between libraries and museums with both occupying the building and were frequently connected to a temple or royal palace. The Museum of Alexandria is believed to be one of the earliest museums in the world. While it connected to the Library of Alexandria it is not clear if the museum was in a different building from the library or was part of the library complex. While little was known about the museum it was an inspiration for museums during the early Renaissance period. The royal palaces also functioned as a kind of museum outfitted with art and objects from conquered territories and gifts from ambassadors from other kingdoms allowing the ruler to display the amassed collections to guests and to visiting dignitaries.

Also in Alexandria from the time of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (r. 285–246 BCE), was the first zoological park. At first used by Philadelphus in an attempt to domesticate African elephants for use in war, the elephants were also used for show along with a menagerie of other animals specimens including hartebeests, ostriches, zebras, leopards, giraffes, rhinoceros, and pythons.

Early
Early museums began as the private collections of wealthy individuals, families or institutions of art and rare or curious natural objects and artifacts. These were often displayed in so-called "wonder rooms" or cabinets of curiosities. These contemporary museums first emerged in western Europe, then spread into other parts of the world.

Public access to these museums was often possible for the "respectable", especially to private art collections, but at the whim of the owner and his staff. One way that elite men during this time period gained a higher social status in the world of elites was by becoming a collector of these curious objects and displaying them. Many of the items in these collections were new discoveries and these collectors or naturalists, since many of these people held interest in natural sciences, were eager to obtain them. By putting their collections in a museum and on display, they not only got to show their fantastic finds but also used the museum as a way to sort and "manage the empirical explosion of materials that wider dissemination of ancient texts, increased travel, voyages of discovery, and more systematic forms of communication and exchange had produced".

One of these naturalists and collectors was Ulisse Aldrovandi, whose collection policy of gathering as many objects and facts about them was "encyclopedic" in nature, reminiscent of that of Pliny, the Roman philosopher and naturalist. The idea was to consume and collect as much knowledge as possible, to put everything they collected and everything they knew in these displays. In time, however, museum philosophy would change and the encyclopedic nature of information that was so enjoyed by Aldrovandi and his cohorts would be dismissed as well as "the museums that contained this knowledge". The 18th-century scholars of the Age of Enlightenment saw their ideas of the museum as superior and based their natural history museums on "organization and taxonomy" rather than displaying everything in any order after the style of Aldrovandi.

The first "public" museums were often accessible only by the middle and upper classes. It could be difficult to gain entrance. When the British Museum opened to the public in 1759, it was a concern that large crowds could damage the artifacts. Prospective visitors to the British Museum had to apply in writing for admission, and small groups were allowed into the galleries each day. The British Museum became increasingly popular during the 19th century, amongst all age groups and social classes who visited the British Museum, especially on public holidays.

The Ashmolean Museum, however, founded in 1677 from the personal collection of Elias Ashmole, was set up in the University of Oxford to be open to the public and is considered by some to be the first modern public museum. The collection included that of Elias Ashmole which he had collected himself, including objects he had acquired from the gardeners, travellers and collectors John Tradescant the elder and his son of the same name. The collection included antique coins, books, engravings, geological specimens, and zoological specimens—one of which was the stuffed body of the last dodo ever seen in Europe; but by 1755 the stuffed dodo was so moth-eaten that it was destroyed, except for its head and one claw. The museum opened on 24 May 1683, with naturalist Robert Plot as the first keeper. The first building, which became known as the Old Ashmolean, is sometimes attributed to Sir Christopher Wren or Thomas Wood.

In France, the first public museum was the Louvre in Paris, opened in 1793 during the French Revolution, which enabled for the first time free access to the former French royal collections for people of all stations and status. The fabulous art treasures collected by the French monarchy over centuries were accessible to the public three days each "décade" (the 10-day unit which had replaced the week in the French Republican Calendar). The Conservatoire du muséum national des Arts (National Museum of Arts's Conservatory) was charged with organizing the Louvre as a national public museum and the centerpiece of a planned national museum system. As Napoléon I conquered the great cities of Europe, confiscating art objects as he went, the collections grew and the organizational task became more and more complicated. After Napoleon was defeated in 1815, many of the treasures he had amassed were gradually returned to their owners (and many were not). His plan was never fully realized, but his concept of a museum as an agent of nationalistic fervor had a profound influence throughout Europe.

Chinese and Japanese visitors to Europe were fascinated by the museums they saw there, but had cultural difficulties in grasping their purpose and finding an equivalent Chinese or Japanese term for them. Chinese visitors in the early 19th century named these museums based on what they contained, so defined them as "bone amassing buildings" or "courtyards of treasures" or "painting pavilions" or "curio stores" or "halls of military feats" or "gardens of everything". Japan first encountered Western museum institutions when it participated in Europe's World's Fairs in the 1860s. The British Museum was described by one of their delegates as a 'hakubutsukan', a 'house of extensive things' – this would eventually become accepted as the equivalent word for 'museum' in Japan and China.

Modern
American museums eventually joined European museums as the world's leading centers for the production of new knowledge in their fields of interest. A period of intense museum building, in both an intellectual and physical sense was realized in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (this is often called "The Museum Period" or "The Museum Age"). While many American museums, both natural history museums and art museums alike, were founded with the intention of focusing on the scientific discoveries and artistic developments in North America, many moved to emulate their European counterparts in certain ways (including the development of Classical collections from ancient Egypt, Greece, Mesopotamia, and Rome). Drawing on Michel Foucault's concept of liberal government, Tony Bennett has suggested the development of more modern 19th-century museums was part of new strategies by Western governments to produce a citizenry that, rather than be directed by coercive or external forces, monitored and regulated its own conduct. To incorporate the masses in this strategy, the private space of museums that previously had been restricted and socially exclusive were made public. As such, objects and artifacts, particularly those related to high culture, became instruments for these "new tasks of social management". Universities became the primary centers for innovative research in the United States well before the start of World War II. Nevertheless, museums to this day contribute new knowledge to their fields and continue to build collections that are useful for both research and display.

The late twentieth century witnessed intense debate concerning the repatriation of religious, ethnic, and cultural artifacts housed in museum collections. In the United States, several Native American tribes and advocacy groups have lobbied extensively for the repatriation of sacred objects and the reburial of human remains. In 1990, Congress passed the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), which required federal agencies and federally funded institutions to repatriate Native American "cultural items" to culturally affiliate tribes and groups. Similarly, many European museum collections often contain objects and cultural artifacts acquired through imperialism and colonization. Some historians and scholars have criticized the British Museum for its possession of rare antiquities from Egypt, Greece, and the Middle East.

Management
The roles associated with the management of a museum largely depend on the size of the institution. Together, the Board and the Director establish a system of governance that is guided by policies that set standards for the institution. Documents that set these standards include an institutional or strategic plan, institutional code of ethics, bylaws, and collections policy. The American Alliance of Museums (AAM) has also formulated a series of standards and best practices that help guide the management of museums.

Various positions within the museum carry out the policies established by the Board and the Director. All museum employees should work together toward the museum's institutional goal. Here is a list of positions commonly found at museums:
 * Board of Trustees or Board of directors – The board governs the museum and is responsible for ensuring the museum is financially and ethically sound. They set standards and policies for the museum. Board members are often involved in fundraising aspects of the museum and represent the institution. Some museum use the terms "directors" and "trustees" interchangeably but both are different legal instruments. A board of directors governs a nonprofit corporation, a board of trustees is responsible for governing a charitable trust, foundation, or endowment. In the case of small museums and all volunteer museums, a board may be more hands-on in the day-to-day operations of the museum.
 * Director- The director is the face of the museum to the professional and public community. They communicate closely with the board to guide and govern the museum. They work with the staff to ensure the museum runs smoothly. According to museum professionals Hugh H. Genoways and Lynne M. Ireland, "Administration of the organization requires skill in conflict management, interpersonal relations, budget management and monitoring, and staff supervision and evaluation. Managers must also set legal and ethical standards and maintain involvement in the museum profession."
 * Curator – Curators are the intellectual drivers behind exhibits. They research the museum's collection and topic of focus, develop exhibition themes, and publish their research aimed at either a public or academic audience. Larger museums have curators in a variety of areas. For example, The Henry Ford has a Curator of Transportation, a Curator of Public Life, a Curator of Decorative Arts, etc. Many art museums have curators dedicated to specific historic periods and geographic regions, such as American art and modern or contemporary art.
 * Collections Management – Collections managers are primarily responsible for the hands-on care, movement, and storage of objects. They are responsible for the accessibility of collections and collections policy.
 * Registrar – Registrars are the primary record keepers of the collection. They insure that objects are properly accessioned, documented, insured, and, when appropriate, loaned. Ethical and legal issues related to the collection are dealt with by registrars. Along with collections managers, they uphold the museum's collections policy.
 * Educator – Museum educators are responsible for educating museum audiences. Their duties can include designing tours and public programs for children and adults, teacher training, developing classroom and continuing education resources, community outreach, and volunteer management. Educators not only work with the public, but also collaborate with other museum staff on exhibition and program development to ensure that exhibits are audience-friendly.
 * Exhibit Designer – Exhibit designers are in charge of the layout and physical installation of exhibits. They create a conceptual design and then bring it to fruition in the physical space.
 * Conservator – Conservators focus on object restoration. More than preserving the object in its present state, they seek to stabilize and repair artifacts to the condition of an earlier era.

Other positions commonly found at museums include: building operator, public programming staff, photographer, librarian, archivist, groundskeeper, volunteer coordinator, preparator, security staff, development officer, membership officer, business officer, gift shop manager, public relations staff, and graphic designer.

At smaller museums, staff members often fulfill multiple roles. Some of these positions are excluded entirely or may be carried out by a contractor when necessary.

Protection
The cultural property stored in museums is threatened in many countries by natural disaster, war, terrorist attacks or other emergencies. To this end, an internationally important aspect is a strong bundling of existing resources and the networking of existing specialist competencies in order to prevent any loss or damage to cultural property or to keep damage as low as possible. International partner for museums is UNESCO and Blue Shield International in accordance with the Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property from 1954 and its 2nd Protocol from 1999. For legal reasons, there are many international collaborations between museums, and the local Blue Shield organizations.

Blue Shield has conducted extensive missions to protect museums and cultural assets in armed conflict, such as 2011 in Egypt and Libya, 2013 in Syria and 2014 in Mali and Iraq. During these operations, the looting of the collection is to be prevented in particular.

Planning

The design of museums has evolved throughout history. However, museum planning involves planning the actual mission of the museum along with planning the space that the collection of the museum will be housed in. Intentional museum planning has its beginnings with the museum founder and librarian John Cotton Dana. Dana detailed the process of founding the Newark Museum in a series of books in the early 20th century so that other museum founders could plan their museums. Dana suggested that potential founders of museums should form a committee first, and reach out to the community for input as to what the museum should supply or do for the community. According to Dana, museums should be planned according to community's needs:

"The new museum ... does not build on an educational superstition. It examines its community's life first, and then straightway bends its energies to supplying some the material which that community needs, and to making that material's presence widely known, and to presenting it in such a way as to secure it for the maximum of use and the maximum efficiency of that use."

The way that museums are planned and designed vary according to what collections they house, but overall, they adhere to planning a space that is easily accessed by the public and easily displays the chosen artifacts. These elements of planning have their roots with John Cotton Dana, who was perturbed at the historical placement of museums outside of cities, and in areas that were not easily accessed by the public, in gloomy European style buildings.

Questions of accessibility continue to the present day. Many museums strive to make their buildings, programming, ideas, and collections more publicly accessible than in the past. Not every museum is participating in this trend, but that seems to be the trajectory of museums in the twenty-first century with its emphasis on inclusiveness. One pioneering way museums are attempting to make their collections more accessible is with open storage. Most of a museum's collection is typically locked away in a secure location to be preserved, but the result is most people never get to see the vast majority of collections. The Brooklyn Museum's Luce Center for American Art practices this open storage where the public can view items not on display, albeit with minimal interpretation. The practice of open storage is all part of an ongoing debate in the museum field of the role objects play and how accessible they should be.

In terms of modern museums, interpretive museums, as opposed to art museums, have missions reflecting curatorial guidance through the subject matter which now include content in the form of images, audio and visual effects, and interactive exhibits. Museum creation begins with a museum plan, created through a museum planning process. The process involves identifying the museum's vision and the resources, organization and experiences needed to realize this vision. A feasibility study, analysis of comparable facilities, and an interpretive plan are all developed as part of the museum planning process.

Some museum experiences have very few or no artifacts and do not necessarily call themselves museums, and their mission reflects this; the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles and the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, being notable examples where there are few artifacts, but strong, memorable stories are told or information is interpreted. In contrast, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. uses many artifacts in their memorable exhibitions.

Museums are laid out in a specific way for a specific reason and each person who enters the doors of a museum will see its collection completely differently to the person behind them- this is what makes museums fascinating because they are represented differently to each individual.

Financial uses
In recent years, some cities have turned to museums as an avenue for economic development or rejuvenation. This is particularly true in the case of postindustrial cities. Examples of museums fulfilling these economic roles exist around the world. For example, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao was built in Bilbao, Spain in a move by the Basque regional government to revitalize the dilapidated old port area of that city. The Basque government agreed to pay $100 million for the construction of the museum, a price tag that caused many Bilbaoans to protest against the project. Nonetheless, over 1.1 million people visited the museum in 2015, indicating it appeared to have paid off for the local government despite local backlash; key to this is the large demographic of foreign visitors to the museum, with 63% of the visitors residing outside of Spain and thus feeding foreign investment straight into Bilbao. A similar project to that undertaken in Bilbao was the Titanic Belfast, built on disused shipyards in Belfast, Northern Ireland, incidentally for the same price as the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao and by the same architect, Frank Gehry, in time for the 100th anniversary of Titanic 's maiden voyage in 2012. Initially expecting modest visitor numbers of 425,000 annually, first year visitor numbers reached over 800,000, with almost 60% coming from outside Northern Ireland. In the United States, similar projects include the 81,000 square foot Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke, Virginia and The Broad in Los Angeles.

Museums being used as a cultural economic driver by city and local governments has proven to be controversial among museum activists and local populations alike. Public protests have occurred in numerous cities which have tried to employ museums in this way. While most subside if a museum is successful, as happened in Bilbao, others continue especially if a museum struggles to attract visitors. The Taubman Museum of Art is an example of an expensive museum (eventually $66 million) that attained little success and continues to have a low endowment for its size. Some museum activists see this method of museum use as a deeply flawed model for such institutions. Steven Conn, one such museum proponent, believes that "to ask museums to solve our political and economic problems is to set them up for inevitable failure and to set us (the visitor) up for inevitable disappointment."

Funding
Museums are facing funding shortages. Funding for museums comes from four major categories, and as of 2009 the breakdown for the United States is as follows: Government support (at all levels) 24.4%, private (charitable) giving 36.5%, earned income 27.6%, and investment income 11.5%. Government funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the largest museum funder in the United States, decreased by 19.586 million between 2011 and 2015, adjusted for inflation. The average spent per visitor in an art museum in 2016 was $8 between admissions, store and restaurant, where the average expense per visitor was $55. Corporations, which fall into the private giving category, can be a good source of funding to make up the funding gap. The amount corporations currently give to museums accounts for just 5% of total funding. Corporate giving to the arts, however, was set to increase by 3.3% in 2017.

Exhibition design
Most mid-size and large museums employ exhibit design staff for graphic and environmental design projects, including exhibitions. In addition to traditional 2-D and 3-D designers and architects, these staff departments may include audio-visual specialists, software designers, audience research, evaluation specialists, writers, editors, and preparators or art handlers. These staff specialists may also be charged with supervising contract design or production services. The exhibit design process builds on the interpretive plan for an exhibit, determining the most effective, engaging and appropriate methods of communicating a message or telling a story. The process will often mirror the architectural process or schedule, moving from conceptual plan, through schematic design, design development, contract document, fabrication, and installation. Museums of all sizes may also contract the outside services of exhibit fabrication businesses.

Some museum scholars have even begun to question whether museums truly need artifacts at all. Historian Steven Conn provocatively asks this question, suggesting that there are fewer objects in all museums now, as they have been progressively replaced by interactive technology. As educational programming has grown in museums, mass collections of objects have receded in importance. This is not necessarily a negative development; Dorothy Canfield Fisher observed that the reduction in objects has pushed museums to grow from institutions that artlessly showcased their many artifacts (in the style of early cabinets of curiosity) to instead "thinning out" the objects presented "for a general view of any given subject or period, and to put the rest away in archive-storage-rooms, where they could be consulted by students, the only people who really needed to see them". This phenomenon of disappearing objects is especially present in science museums like the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, which have a high visitorship of school-aged children who may benefit more from hands-on interactive technology than reading a label beside an artifact.

Types
There is no definitive standard as to the set types of museums. Additionally, the museum landscape has become so varied, that it may not be sufficient to use traditional categories to comprehend fully the vast variety existing throughout the world. However, it may be useful to categorize museums in different ways under multiple perspectives. Museums can vary based on size, from large institutions, to very small institutions focusing on specific subjects, such as a specific location, a notable person, or a given period of time. Museums also can be based on the main source of funding: central or federal government, provinces, regions, universities; towns and communities; other subsidised; nonsubsidised and private.

It may sometimes be useful to distinguish between diachronic museums which interpret the way its subject matter has developed and evolved through time (e.g. Lower East Side Tenement Museum and Diachronic Museum of Larissa), and synchronic museums which interpret the way its subject matter existed at a certain point in time (e.g. the Anne Frank House and Colonial Williamsburg). According to University of Florida Professor Eric Kilgerman, "While a museum in which a particular narrative unfolds within its halls is diachronic, those museums that limit their space to a single experience are called synchronic."

In her book Civilizing the Museum, author Elaine Heumann Gurian proposes that there are five categories of museums based on intention and not content: object centered, narrative, client centered, community centered, and national.

Museums can also be categorized into major groups by the type of collections they display, to include: fine arts, applied arts, craft, archaeology, anthropology and ethnology, biography, history, cultural history, science, technology, children's museums, natural history, botanical and zoological gardens. Within these categories, many museums specialize further, e.g. museums of modern art, folk art, local history, military history, aviation history, philately, agriculture, or geology. The size of a museum's collection typically determines the museum's size, whereas its collection reflects the type of museum it is. Many museums normally display a "permanent collection" of important selected objects in its area of specialization, and may periodically display "special collections" on a temporary basis.

Major types
The following is a list to give an idea of the major museum types. While comprehensive, it is not a definitive list.

 * Agricultural
 * Architecture
 * Archaeological
 * Art
 * Design
 * Biographical
 * Children's
 * Community
 * Encyclopedic
 * Folk
 * Historic house
 * Historic site
 * Living history
 * Local
 * Maritime
 * Medical
 * Memorial
 * Military
 * Natural history
 * Open-air
 * Science
 * Virtual

Public vs. private
Private museums are organized by individuals and managed by a board and museum officers, but public museums are created and managed by federal, state, or local governments. A government can charter a museum through legislative action but the museum can still be private as it is not part of the government. The distinction regulates the ownership and legal accountability for the care of the collections.

Non-profit vs. for-profit
Nonprofit means that an organization is classified as a charitable corporation and is exempt from paying most taxes and the money the organization earns is invested in the organization itself. Money made by a private, for-profit museum is paid to the museum's owners or shareholders.

The nonprofit museum has a fiduciary responsibility in regards to the public, in essence the museum holds its collections and administers it for the benefit of the public. Collections of for-profit museums are legally corporate assets the museum administers for the benefit of the owners or shareholders.

Run by trusts vs. corporations
A trust is a legal instrument where trustees manage the trust's assets for the benefit of the museum following the specific wishes of the donor. This provides tax benefits for the donor, and also allows the donor to have control over how assets are distributed.

Corporations are legal entities and may acquire property in a way similar to how an individual can own property. Museums under incorporation are usually organized by a community or group of individuals. While a board of director's loyalty is to the corporation, a board of trustee's loyalty has to be loyal to the intention of the trust. The ramification is that a trust is far less flexible than a corporation.

Decolonization
A global movement for the decolonization of museums has been gaining momentum since the late 20th century. Proponents of this movement argue that "museums are a box of things" and do not represent complete stories; instead they show biased narratives based on ideologies, in which certain stories are intentionally disregarded. Through this, people are encouraging others to consider this missing perspective, when looking at museum collections, as every object viewed in such environments was placed by an individual to represent a certain viewpoint, be it historical or cultural.

The 2018 report on the restitution of African cultural heritage is a prominent example regarding the decolonization of museums and other collections in France and the claims of African countries to regain artifacts illegally taken from their original cultural settings.

Since 1868, several monolithic human figures known as Moai have been removed from Easter Island and put in display in major Western museums such as the National Museum of Natural History, the British Museum, the Louvre and the Royal Museums of Art and History. Several demands have been made by Easter Island residents for the return of the Moai. The figures are seen as ancestors and family or the soul by the Rapa Nui and hold deep cultural value to their people. Other examples include the Gweagal Shield, thought to be a very significant shield taken from Botany Bay in April 1770 or the Parthenon marble sculptures, which were taken from Greece by Lord Elgin in 1805. Successive Greek governments have unsuccessfully petitioned for the return of the Parthenon marbles. Another example among many others is the so-called Montezuma's headdress in the Museum of Ethnology, Vienna, which is a source of dispute between Austria and Mexico.

Labor issues and unionization
The past few years has seen a unionizing movement. US museums workers have initiated dialogs about labor and collective organizing in the cultural sector. In 2019 the workers in multiple museums voted to form unions with more protesting to press for a fair contract and against unfair labor practices. During that year over 3,000 cultural workers anonymously started to share their salaries online through a pay transparency spreadsheet.
 * Background

The Marciano Art Foundation, a museum established by co-founders of Guess clothing, Maurice Marciano and Paul Marciano closed indefinitely in November 2019 after workers attempted to unionize. The Marciano Foundation released a statement a month later that the closure was permanent.

In the country of Georgia 40 employees were fired May 2022 as part of a restructuring. The newly formed union, the Georgian Trade Union of Science, Education, and Culture Workers said in a statement they said the employees were fired illegally and the reorganization was "carried out by the employer in an untransparent and maladministered manner" and that the organization will "definitely fight to the end to protect the rights of employees." Fired senior curator Maia Pataridze said the new management mentioned her social media posts criticizing the government. Among those fired was union chair, Nikoloz Tsikaridze, a senior researcher and archaeologist who associated the discharging of himself and other museum staff was for forming a union, and said that Thea Tsulukiani, the Georgia Minister of Culture had "punished" them.

In the United States, labor unrest within the arts and cultural sector go back at least nearly a century to 1933 when a New York-based collective of artists eventually known as the Artist's Union used collective bargaining for state relief for unemployed artists. In 1971 administrative staff at New York's Museum of Modern Art formed the organization "Professional and Staff Association of the Museum of Modern Art" (PASTA), the first union of professional employees, as opposed to maintenance and service people, at a privately‐financed museum. The contract negotiated would provide a wage increase, protection against termination without cause, and direct access to trustees and policy-making processes at the museum. While there was some interest from workers at other museums at the time, for the next fifty years there was little change in museums adding union representation of their professional employees.
 * History

Sustainability and climate change
Increasingly museums have been responded to the ongoing climate crisis through enacting sustainable museum practices, and exhibitions highlighting the issues surrounding climate change and the Anthropocene.

Diversity and inclusion
As well as an argument for the decolonization of museums, there is also the push by some to represent, in both exhibitions and new museums, the marginalized communities within a culture or society. One example of this is the work of archivist and diverse heritage specialist Norma Gregory in Nottingham, England. Gregory has set up the Black Miner's Museum and has curated an exhibition entitled The Digging Deep Project Exhibition.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Museum


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U-boot (cocktail)

A U-boot is a beer cocktail that is made by placing a shot of vodka into a glass of beer, typically a lager. It is popular in Germany, Poland, North Macedonia, and Flanders. In Germany, the liquor korn is sometimes used instead, while in Flanders and the Netherlands, jonge jenever is preferred.

It is called a U-boot (German abbreviation of Unterseeboot, "submarine") because the shot glass of vodka sinks to the bottom of the glass of beer. The shot glass then "surfaces" when the cocktail is drunk.

Preparation
Place a shot glass on upside down glass and fill it with vodka. Place a pint glass over the two glasses so it sits against the shot glass and flip them over. Fill the pint glass with lager and as the drink is consumed the vodka will leak into drink.

Other names and variations
In Flanders and the Netherlands, it is called a "Duikboot", literally translated "Submarine". It is seen as a variant on the kopstoot (lit. "headbutt") in the Netherlands. The kopstoot is a shot of jenever followed by a beer as a chaser.

In North Macedonia it is called "Подморница" - "Podmornica", literally translated "Submarine". It uses tequila which is being dropped into a big pint.

In southern Germany, U-boot is usually served as a combination of Fanta and cognac instead of beer and vodka.

In Mexico, it is called "Submarino", Spanish for "Submarine". Instead of vodka, it uses tequila, and the shot glass must be left inverted inside the beer glass.

In Russia, it is most often called "Глубинная бомба", Russian for "Depth charge". Usually any cocktail, mixing vodka and beer called in Russia "Ёрш", (Yorsh) literally meaning a wire brush. It is also rarely called "Водолаз" - "Vodolaz", literally translated as "Diver".

In Sorbia, vodka and orange juice is used.

In Brazil, it is called "Submarino", Portuguese for "Submarine". In the south, where it is more easily found, it is common practice to use steinhäger instead of vodka.

In Sweden, it is called "Ubåt", Swedish for "Submarine". Jägermeister is used instead of vodka.

In Greece, it is called "υποβρύχιο", Greek for "Submarine". Served as a shot glass of Jack Daniels sink into the bottom of a short glass of beer.

title: U-boot (cocktail)


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Padthaway, South Australia

Padthaway is a small town in the Australian state of South Australia located in the state's south-east within the Limestone Coast region about 253 km south east of the state capital of Adelaide and about 41 km south-east of the municipal seat of Bordertown. The name is derived from the Potawurutj, the Aboriginal name word for cover or bury. Padthaway is in the Tatiara District Council, the state electorate of MacKillop and the federal Division of Barker.

The 2016 Australian census which was conducted in August 2016 reports that Padthaway had a population of 418 people.

History
Padthaway was the name of the original pastoral station which was established on Bodaruwitj Aboriginal lands in this area in 1847 by a successful Scottish businessman, Robert Lawson. In 1882 the Padthaway Estate Homestead was built by Eliza and Robert Lawson. The historic Padthaway Estate complex is listed on the South Australian Heritage Register.

In 1952 Padthaway became the centre of a soldier settlement scheme. The first vineyards were planted here in 1964 and quickly transformed marginal grazing land into a top wine-producing region. White wines, especially, from the region are regular winners of major awards. These wines may be purchased at the local cellar door sales and at wine retailers around Australia. Agriculture is also strong in Padthaway with onion, olives and seeds being grown along with sheep and cattle which are reared for sale.

Padthaway has a cluster of businesses located in the heart of town including a deli, general store, two rural service centres, an auto and engineering centre, a caravan park, and a park with a playground in the main street, Memorial Drive.

Other public amenities include netball and tennis courts, football oval, town hall, sports complex, medical clinic, playground, skate park and rotunda. The toilets are right near the playground. In 2010 a new medical clinic was built.

The Padthaway Conservation Park which is situated on a former coastal dune is located about 2.5 km north-east of the town centre. The conservation park has stands of yellow gum, ribbon gum, brown stringybark, manna gums, many acacias and banksias. It is also home to a variety of animals including koalas, birds, rabbits, kangaroos and many insects. Sometimes the rare fire orchid may be viewed in flower.

Wine region
Padthaway is also the name of a wine region surrounding the town. It is home to several large commercial vineyards. The oldest vineyard was established in 1964 by Seppelts, with Lindeman's, Hardys and Wynns also establishing vineyards in the 1960s. The wine region is 62 km long and 8 km wide with over 4000 ha of vineyards. There are only a few cellar doors operating in the region.

Sports
Records for lawn bowls being played in Padthaway go back to 1963. Lawn bowls is played in Padthaway on Saturday during the summer time. Padthaway bowling club plays in the Upper South East association.

The last A grade cricket premiership Padthaway won was in 1993. Padthaway has had a B grade side most years since. Padthaway came fifth in the competition in 2010–2011. In 2011 there was only one competition, an A grade side.

Netball has been played in Padthaway since the mid-late 1960s. In 2011 the Padthaway Netball Club, also called the Lions, has more than seven different teams for netball.

The Padthaway Football Club which commenced in 1967 is known as the Lions and is the main club of the town, competing in the Kowree-Naracoorte-Tatiara Football League. The football club won an A grade premiership grand final in 1993 against Bordertown.

The Padthaway Tennis Club dates back to 1962 and 1972 when the club laid new concrete courts. The Padthaway Tennis club won many premierships between the mid-1970s and into the late 1980s. Tennis is currently played as a social competition on Wednesday nights for a six-eight-week season in the summer before Christmas.

The Padthaway golf course is carved out of scrubland. This tight course is a challenge even for the most professional of golfers. The Padthaway golf club was opened in 1988 and has 9 holes with scrapes.

The community
Apex is a community group which operates in Padthaway composed of men between the ages of 18 and 45 who work together to promote social justice and raise awareness of charity causes by fundraising in interesting and creative ways.

Padthaway has an active Women in Agricultural Business group. WAB is a statewide network with branches throughout SA. It is an organisation for women interested in rural, agricultural and business issues. It provides the opportunity for self-development and friendship.

Schools
The school was built in 1935 and had its 75-year anniversary in 2010. The event was attended by many past, current and future students and staff and a time capsule was buried on the day. In 2011 Padthaway Primary School had 52 students and 12 staff members. Padthaway Primary School caters for years Reception-7 and also has a Child Parent Centre (CPC). At Padthaway Primary School the Student Representative Council (SRC) organises many fundraising activities for students to participate in.

Padthaway Primary School is a school with many activities for students such as the Come out, SAPSASA, Youth Environmental Forum, pancake day, Student Young Leaders Day and school camp. SAPSASA events include football, netball, cricket, tennis, cross country, athletics running events, swimming, diving, golf, hockey and skiing.

title: Padthaway, South Australia


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Offa's Dyke

Offa's Dyke (Clawdd Offa) is a large linear earthwork that roughly follows the border between England and Wales. The structure is named after Offa, the Anglo-Saxon king of Mercia from AD 757 until 796, who is traditionally believed to have ordered its construction. Although its precise original purpose is debated, it delineated the border between Anglian Mercia and the Welsh kingdom of Powys.

The earthwork, which was up to 65 ft wide (including its flanking ditch) and 8 ft high, traversed low ground, hills and rivers. Today it is protected as a scheduled monument. Some of its route is followed by the Offa's Dyke Path, a 177 mi long-distance footpath that runs between Liverpool Bay in the north and the Severn Estuary in the south.

Although the Dyke has conventionally been dated to the Early Middle Ages of Anglo-Saxon England, research in recent decades – using techniques such as radioactive carbon dating – has challenged the conventional historiography and theories about the earthwork and shows that part was started in the early 5th century, during the sub-Roman period.

Background

The generally accepted theory of the earthwork attributes most of its construction to Offa, King of Mercia from 757 to 796. The structure did not represent a mutually agreed boundary between the Mercians and the Kingdom of Powys. It had a ditch on the Welsh (western) side, with the displaced soil piled into a bank on the Mercian (eastern) side. This suggests that Mercians constructed it as a defensive earthwork, or to demonstrate the power and intent of their kingdom.

Throughout its entire length, the Dyke provides an uninterrupted view from Mercia into Wales. Where the earthwork encounters hills or high ground, it passes to the west of them.

Although historians often overlook Offa's reign because of limitations in source material, he ranks as one of the greatest Anglo-Saxon rulers – as evidenced in his ability to raise the workforce and resources required to construct Offa's Dyke. The construction of the earthwork probably involved a corvée system requiring vassals to build certain lengths of the earthwork for Offa in addition to performing their normal services to their king. The Tribal Hidage, a primary document, shows the distribution of land within 8th-century Britain; it shows that peoples were located within specified territories for administration.

Early scholarship
The first historians and archaeologists to examine the Dyke seriously compared their conclusions with the late 9th-century writer Asser, who wrote: "there was in Mercia in fairly recent time a certain vigorous king called Offa, who terrified all the neighbouring kings and provinces around him, and who had a great dyke built between Wales and Mercia from sea to sea". In 1955, Sir Cyril Fox published the first major survey of the Dyke. He concurred with Asser that the earthwork ran 'from sea to sea', theorising that the Dyke ran from the River Dee estuary in the north to the River Wye in the south: approximately 150 mi. Although Fox observed that Offa's Dyke was not a continuous linear structure, he concluded that earthworks were raised in only those areas where natural barriers did not already exist.

Sir Frank Stenton, the UK's most eminent 20th-century scholar on Anglo-Saxon England, accepted Fox's conclusions. He wrote the introduction to Fox's account of the Dyke. Although Fox's work has now been revised to some extent, it still remains a vital record of some stretches of Offa's Dyke that still existed between 1926 and 1928, when his three field surveys took place, but have since been destroyed.

Later research
In 1978, Dr Frank Noble challenged some of Fox's conclusions, stirring up new academic interest in Offa's Dyke. His MPhil thesis entitled "Offa's Dyke Reviewed" (1978) raised several questions concerning the accepted historiography of Offa's Dyke. Noble postulated that the gaps in the Dyke were not due to the incorporation of natural features as defensive barriers, but instead the gaps were a "ridden boundary", perhaps incorporating palisades, that left no archaeological trace. Noble also helped establish the Offa's Dyke Association, which maintains the Offa's Dyke Path. This long-distance footpath mostly follows the route of the dyke and is a designated British National Trail.

John Davies wrote of Fox's study: "In the planning of it, there was a degree of consultation with the kings of Powys and Gwent. On the Long Mountain near Trelystan, the dyke veers to the east, leaving the fertile slopes in the hands of the Welsh; near Rhiwabon, it was designed to ensure that Cadell ap Brochwel retained possession of the Fortress of Penygadden." And, for Gwent, Offa had the dyke built "on the eastern crest of the gorge, clearly with the intention of recognizing that the River Wye and its traffic belonged to the kingdom of Gwent".

Ongoing research and archaeology on Offa's Dyke has been undertaken for many years by the Extra-Mural Department of the University of Manchester. Interviews with Dr David Hill, broadcast in episode 1 of In Search of the Dark Ages (aired in 1979), show support for Noble's idea. Most recently, Hill and Margaret Worthington have undertaken considerable research on the Dyke. Their work, though far from finished, has demonstrated that there is little evidence for the Dyke stretching from sea to sea. Rather, they claim that it is a shorter structure stretching from Rushock Hill north of the Herefordshire Plain to Llanfynydd, near Mold, Flintshire, some 64 miles (103 km). According to Hill and Worthington, dykes in the far north and south may have different dates, and though they may be connected with Offa's Dyke, there is as yet no compelling evidence behind this. However, not all experts accept this view.

Contrary evidence
'Ofer' means 'border' or 'edge' in Old English, giving rise to the possibility of alternative derivations for some border features associated with Offa.

The Roman historian Eutropius in his book Historiae Romanae Breviarium, written around 369, mentions the Wall of Severus, a structure built by Septimius Severus, who was Roman Emperor between 193 and 211: ''Novissimum bellum in Britannia habuit, utque receptas provincias omni securitate muniret, vallum per CXXXIII passuum milia a mari ad mare deduxit. Decessit Eboraci admodum senex, imperii anno sexto decimo, mense tertio. Historiae Romanae Breviarium, viii 19.1''

He had his most recent war in Britain, and to fortify the conquered provinces with all security, he built a wall for 133 miles from sea to sea. He died at York, a reasonably old man, in the sixteenth year and third month of his reign. This source is conventionally thought to be referring, in error, to either Hadrian's Wall, 73 mi, or the Antonine Wall, 37 mi, which were both shorter and built in the 2nd century. Recently, some writers have suggested that Eutropius may have been referring to the earthwork later called Offa's Dyke. Most archaeologists reject this theory.

The Venerable Bede also mentions the barrier built by Septimus Severus, but Bede says that the rampart was made of earth and timber, a description which would closer match Offa's Dyke than Hadrian's Wall, though it would describe the Antonine Wall: After many great and severe battles, (Severus) thought fit to divide that part of the island, which he had recovered, from the other unconquered nations, not with a wall, as some imagine, but with a rampart. For a wall is made of stones, but a rampart, with which camps are fortified to repel the assaults of enemies, is made of sods, cut out of the earth, and raised high above the ground, like a wall, having in front of it the trench whence the sods were taken, with strong stakes of wood fixed above it. Thus Severus drew a great trench and strong rampart, fortified with several towers, from sea to sea. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of England, Bk 1-5

However, the solution to the problem lies a few chapters later in Bede's account. In Book One Chapter Twelve of Bede's Ecclesiastical History, he writes that the Romans "built a strong wall of stone directly from sea to sea in a straight line between the towns that had been built as strong-points, where Severus had built his earthwork ... straight from east to west". The strong wall of stone cannot refer to the Antonine Wall or Offa's Dyke, so it clearly refers to Hadrian's Wall, especially as Offa's Dyke runs from north to south. Also, as Severus's earthwork is described as being in the same location as Hadrian's Wall, it cannot be Offa's Dyke either, so the earth rampart with a great trench that Bede refers to must be the Vallum, the adjoining earthen barrier immediately south of Hadrian's Wall. Where Bede got it wrong was in attributing the Vallum to Septimius Severus, and saying that it predated the Wall. In fact the Vallum was the work of Hadrian, and slightly post-dated the Wall.

Evidence has also been found that challenges the accepted date of the construction of Offa's Dyke. In December 1999, Shropshire County Council archaeologists uncovered the remains of a hearth or fire on the original ground surface beneath Wat's Dyke near Oswestry. Carbon dating analysis of the burnt charcoal and burnt clay in situ showed it was covered by earth on or around AD 446. Archaeologists concluded that this part of Wat's Dyke, so long thought of as Anglo-Saxon and a mid-8th-century contemporary of Offa's Dyke, must have been built 300 years earlier in the post-Roman period.

In 2014, excavations by the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust focused on nine samples of the Dyke near Chirk. Radiocarbon dating of redeposited turf resulted in a series of dates. In one section, these ranged from AD 430 to AD 652 and in another section from AD 887 to AD 1019: confirming that the bank is clearly post-Roman, and that at least some rebuilding work took place after Offa's reign. It has been suggested that Offa's Dyke may have been a long-term project by several Mercian kings. Further excavations by Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust on the Dyke at Chirk Castle found well-preserved remains of the ditch under later parkland; radiocarbon samples were recovered, but the results have not yet been made public.

Current
The England–Wales border still mostly passes within a few miles of the course of Offa's Dyke through the Welsh Marches. A 3 mi section of the Dyke which overlooks Tintern Abbey and includes the Devil's Pulpit near Chepstow is now managed by English Heritage.

Statutory protection
All sections of Offa's Dyke that survive as visible earthworks, or as infilled but undeveloped ditch, are designated as a scheduled monument. However, some parts of the Dyke may also remain buried under later development. Some sections are also defined as Sites of Special Scientific Interest, including stretches within the Lower Wye Valley SSSI and the Highbury Wood National Nature Reserve. Parts are located within the Wye Valley and Shropshire Hills Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Most of the line of Offa's Dyke is designated as a public right of way, including those sections which form part of the Offa's Dyke Path.

In August 2013, a 45 m section of Dyke, between Chirk and Llangollen, was destroyed by a local landowner. The destruction of the Dyke to build a stable was said to be like "driving a road through Stonehenge", but the perpetrator escaped punishment.

Candidate World Heritage Site
In 2010, the Dyke was proposed by the Offa's Dyke Association and local authorities for World Heritage Site status. Part of the proposal stated:

"Offa’s Dyke is a victim of its very scale, nature, meaning and historical success. It is located in two countries, six local authority areas, multiple ownerships and multiple land-use contexts. The main professional stakeholders – such as the English and Welsh path and heritage management agencies – are organisationally and functionally separate. The ancient monument is now often seen as secondary to the modern path, and heritage advice about individual dyke sections is not generally coordinated via any connected overview of the values of the whole monument. Moreover, despite the lasting legacy of Offa's Dyke for English and Welsh communities alike, there is limited public awareness of the monument and its remarkable link to modern ideas of national identity."

The proposal was rejected in 2011.

The Offa's Dyke Centre
The Offa's Dyke Centre is a purpose-built information centre in the town of Knighton, on Offa's Dyke on the border between England (Shropshire) and Wales (Powys). Some of the best remains of the earthworks can be seen within a two-minute walk from the centre.

Offa's Dyke Path
The Offa's Dyke Path (Welsh: Llwybr Clawdd Offa) is a long-distance footpath close to the England–Wales border. Although large sections are close to the Dyke itself, the Path is longer, and in some places passes at some distance from the earthworks. Opened on 10 July 1971, the Path is one of Britain's longest National Trails, stretching for 283 km from the Severn estuary at Sedbury, near Chepstow, to Prestatyn on the north Wales coast. There is a visitor centre at Knighton.

Cultural importance
The dyke has a cultural significance symbolising the separation between England and Wales: a symbolism similar to Hadrian's Wall between England and Scotland in the Scottish Marches. George Borrow, in his Wild Wales (1862), drawn from folklore, claimed that:

"[It] was customary for the English to cut off the ears of every Welshman who was found to the east of the dyke, and for the Welsh to hang every Englishman whom they found to the west of it."

title: Offa's Dyke