Winemaker Notes
#92 Wine Spectator Top 100 of 2025
Gulielmus comes from a five acre vineyard in Taurasi, in the Sala district, where the soil is clay and the traditional guyot trellised vines have been planted, starting from 1992, with buds harvested from the old pre-phylloxera vineyards. The harvest is done by hand between mid-October and early November. After fermentation in steel, the wine ages for 18-24 months in barriques and again in the bottle for over two years prior to release.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
The aromas are fantastic, with black truffles, ash, wet earth, basalt and black pepper. Medium-bodied with firm and intense fruit that goes on for minutes. An excellent and complex single-vineyard aglianico. Drinkable now, but better in two or three years.
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Wine Enthusiast
The nose billows with the savory smokiness of black pepper, chili pepper, hot tar and cumin, while a pop of Mission figs and black plums adds energy. Berries, cherries and more plums lead the way on the palate, before dusty tannins reinvigorate a peppery, metallic earthiness. A serious wine that's also an absolute pleasure to drink.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
This is a delicious wine that reveals a luscious and rich consistency. The Tenute Capaldo 2018 Taurasi Riserva Gulielmus stands apart in a crowd thanks to the generous and seamless nature of its texture. There are no harsh edges here, and the wine is redolent of black fruit, plum and sweet spice. The tannins are integrated and velvety in this wine, which sees anywhere from 18 to 24 months in barrique.
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Wine Spectator
A fresh, savory red, with milled pepper and cured tobacco notes lacing flavors of baked cherry, pomegranate puree, iron, espresso and licorice root. Shows good length and integration, with a powerful frame of refined tannins providing limber muscle and firming the finish.
Making its home in the mountainous southern Italy, Aglianico is a bold red variety that is late to ripen and often spends until November on the vine. It thrives in Campania as the exclusive variety in the age-worthy red wine called Taurasi. Aglianico also has great success in the volcanic soils of Basilicata where it makes the robust, Aglianico del Vulture. Somm Secret—The name “Aglianico” bears striking resemblance to Ellenico, the Italian word for "Greek," but no evidence shows it has Greek ancestry. However, it first appeared in Italy around an ancient Greek colony located in present-day Avellino, Campania.
A winemaking renaissance is underfoot in Campania as more and more small, artisan and family-run wineries redefine their style with vineyard improvements and cellar upgrades. The region boasts a cool Mediterranean climate with extreme coastal, as well as high elevation mountain terroirs. It is cooler than one might expect in Campania; the region usually sees some of the last harvest dates in Italy.
Just south of Mount Vesuvio, the volcanic and sandy soils create aromatic and fresh reds based on Piedirosso and whites, made from Coda di Volpe and Falanghina. Both reds and whites go by the name, Lacryma Christi, meaning the "tears of Christ." South of Mount Vesuvio, along the Amalfi Coast, the white varieties of Falanghina and Biancolella make fresh, flirty, mineral-driven whites, and the red Piedirosso and Sciasinoso vines, which cling to steeply terraced coastlines, make snappy and ripe red wines.
Farther inland, as hills become mountains, the limestone soil of Irpinia supports the whites Fiano di Avellino, Falanghina and Greco di Tufo as well as the most-respected red of the south, Aglianico. Here the best and most age-worthy examples come from Taurasi.
Farther north and inland near the city of Benevento, the Taburno region also produces Aglianico of note—called Aglianico del Taburno—on alluvial soils. While not boasting the same heft as Taurasi, these are also reliable components of any cellar.