Page 249 - Terčelj, Dušan. 2015. The Culture of Wine in Slovenia. Edited by Aleš Gačnik. University of Primorska Press, Koper.
P. 249
ut the Author
Dušan Terčelj was born on 7 September 1923 in Žapuže near Ajdovščina, which then
came under Italy. His father was a great patriot who sent him, after the second year of primary
school, at the age of eight, to be educated in Ljubljana. He attended grammar school in Šentvid
and then Ljubljana. After the end of the war, in 1945, he enrolled on an agronomy course in
Zagreb, where in his last year at the university he specialised in winemaking. He completed
his studies in early 1950. During
his university holidays he worked
at the Wine Institute in Maribor
and on the Pekre and Podlehnik
estates.
Medana, 2004. Photo: Miloš Toni He commenced his first employ-
ment in 1950 at the viticultural
estate in Kapela and the Radgona
wine cellar, and that same year
left to become a trainee at Vino
Brežice. He started putting his
professional ideas and theoreti-
cal knowledge into practice at the
Vinarska zadruga cooperative in
Vipava, where between 1953 and
1959 he was the chief oenologist
and the manager of the wine
cellar. The Vipava wines were
then high in tannins; they were
rough and of a brownish colour
as the farmers were in the habit
of macerating the grapes on their
skins for a number of days. Terčelj
strove for the crushed grapes to
be pressed immediately so as to
achieve smoother, softer wines
with a light golden colour, as
demanded by the market and as
245
Dušan Terčelj was born on 7 September 1923 in Žapuže near Ajdovščina, which then
came under Italy. His father was a great patriot who sent him, after the second year of primary
school, at the age of eight, to be educated in Ljubljana. He attended grammar school in Šentvid
and then Ljubljana. After the end of the war, in 1945, he enrolled on an agronomy course in
Zagreb, where in his last year at the university he specialised in winemaking. He completed
his studies in early 1950. During
his university holidays he worked
at the Wine Institute in Maribor
and on the Pekre and Podlehnik
estates.
Medana, 2004. Photo: Miloš Toni He commenced his first employ-
ment in 1950 at the viticultural
estate in Kapela and the Radgona
wine cellar, and that same year
left to become a trainee at Vino
Brežice. He started putting his
professional ideas and theoreti-
cal knowledge into practice at the
Vinarska zadruga cooperative in
Vipava, where between 1953 and
1959 he was the chief oenologist
and the manager of the wine
cellar. The Vipava wines were
then high in tannins; they were
rough and of a brownish colour
as the farmers were in the habit
of macerating the grapes on their
skins for a number of days. Terčelj
strove for the crushed grapes to
be pressed immediately so as to
achieve smoother, softer wines
with a light golden colour, as
demanded by the market and as
245
