Which is the original?

[stevebody]

The way I got the story, from a professor/pal at Cambridge, is that the grape originated in Croatia and was originally brought to France by Persian traders (the trading heavyweights in almost everything in those days) who couldn't even pronounce the Croat name - and knew that the snotty French wouldn't even try - so they renamed it after their hometown in Persia (Iran): Shiraz. A professor friend of mine at VA Tech, BTW, says the Primitivo made the trip to CA with the waves of Italian immigrants in the 1850s-60s and was planted so heavily that the Californians got sick of it and stopped drinking it. The Italians, wily as they are, later renamed that one for marketing purposes, hence the handle "Zinfandel". I've asked two linguists for the etymology of that word and they both pled ignorance. Doncha love a mystery?