To commemorate the Swiss Guards’ heroic fidelity, a special bottling of the 2020 vintage of one of the world’s greatest wines, Brunello di Montalcino, has been produced by the Swiss-Italian Bertarelli family, from their Tenuta San Giorgio estate, overlooking the glorious Val d’Orcia, south-east of Montalcino.

The label, depicting a Swiss Guard in the Renaissance uniform traditionally associated with Michelangelo, is movingly laconic: Guardia Svizzera Pontificia, 1527, In memoria del Sacco di Roma.
It is impossible to exaggerate the delights of Brunello di Montalcino. It must be made exclusively from a local variety of Sangiovese, Sangiovese Grosso, known simply as Brunello, whose grapes have thick skins, yielding bold fruit, high tannin and high acidity, all of which make for a long-lived, slowly maturing wine.

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