Malbec was first grown in Argentina. The following content is accessible for members only, please sign in.

Although it is now famous in Argentina, Malbec’s ancestral home is Cahors, a tiny, ancient wine region in southwest France. The word malbec is actually a nickname for the grape’s true ampelographic name: Côt. In the nineteenth century, Malbec was a slang term for someone who spoke badly of others. There must have been a lot of malbecs in Cahors, for the word became a common surname—and an affectionate term for the local grapes.