Mazure released a ‘Sparkling Burgundy’ in 1894. As Mazure did not have access to Pinot Noir, he had used Shiraz, which become the preferred variety for the style. Mazure acquired Auldana in 1909 and left in 1922 to establish Romalo Cellars at Magill in the Adelaide foothills, taking Hurtle Walker, who at 14 years of age, had joined Aldana in 1904. Also joining them at Romalo, Hurtle’s son Norm Walker, helped established production of Romala’s Sparkling Shiraz.
Romalo was purchased by Australian Wines Export Pty Ltd and then by S. Wynn & Co. in 1929 who continued producing sparkling wines here under the direction of Hurtle Walker and son Norm. Eventually purchased by Andrew Garrett, currently the maker of Andrew Garrett Sparkling Shiraz at Langhorne Creek, the Romalo winery was burnt in a fire in March 1988, but the original stone building was subsequently restored. The direct link in passing on the sparkling wine making tradition continued via Norm Walker going to Seaview Wines, who still produce Seaview Sparking Red, The tradition then passed to present day O’Leary Walker Vineyard, est in 2000 by Norm’s son Nick Walker.
In Victoria, Great Western had staked its claim as a leading producer of sparkling wines and although established ahead of Auldana, Hans Irvine’s winemaker, Charles Pieriot, who had previously worked at the House of Pommery, released Great Western’s first Sparkling Burgundy, using Pinot Noir, just after Mazure’s. The famous Seppelt family took over Great Western in 1916 and sometime after that, they moved to the use of Shiraz. Seppelt has been the flagship for Australian Sparkling Red to the present day.
​

Before Seppelt purchased Great Western, another famous name was employed by Hans Irvine as his sparkling winemaker, Leo Buring. Around this time, Minchinbury also emerged and vied with Great Western for the position of Australian top sparkling wines, employing Buring from 1902. The first bottles of sparkling red were released in 1908 from the 1903 vintage. Leo Buring left in 1916 and founded Leo Buring Pty Ltd. Minchinbury now only exists as a name, the site, in Sydney’s western suburbs, was sold in 1978 and developed as housing in 2010. ​

Wine shows, which were just as popular in the late 1800’s as now, created new categories to cover this new style of wine and over time other vineyards had joined in the production of Sparkling Burgundy. Auldana did very well with their sparkling red such as in the 1916 the Royal Agricultural Show, where the judges awarded First to Aldana and second to Penfolds in the Australian Sparkling Red style; noting - “A very fine lot of sparkling red wines of the Burgundy Style.” Hans Irvine at Great Western also did very well in shows, both in Australia and overseas, winning Gold at the 1895 Bordeaux Exhibition. Seppelts, staying true to the standards set by Irving, were awarded Firsts, diplomas and Gold in London 1926, London 1927 and Second and Third in Melbourne 1929.i ii iii
The wine was also distributed reasonably widely within Australia – being served at a reception for the Premier in Orange NSW in 1895: In a dreamland, mid a constant flow of champagne and sparkling burgundy, is the Premier's own description of: his "right royal reception" at Orange, and we really don't think anyone need ask a better. It accounts for much in the reports of a sort of intellectual topsyturvydom, during which everything was taken for what it was not, the distinguished visitor at his own valuation, and his purest claptrap for pearls of political wisdom. iv
Between the Great Depression and until the 1980’s these were the lean years for Sparkling Red in national terms; Seppelt’s Great Western, Best’s Great Western, Minchinbury and Romalo, were holding the fort. Making sparkling red for their own use, as most people, especially with a Mediterranean background, who worked at the various vineyards, all preferred cold sparkling red to still red wine with their meals, when picking and other heavy work was carried out in the hot Australian weather.v There was also demand from their regional community, where Sparkling Burgundy was and still is a popular drink. For better or worse - the latter when:  Monica Margaret Flaherty drank a lot of whisky and Sparkling Burgundy at Bacchus Marsh (Vic.) on February 15, 1942, the day before her wedding night. She says she didn't know it was to be her wedding night, and woke up next morning unaware she had been married. Monica asked Mr. Justice Mansfield in Brisbane Supreme Court this week to nullify her marriage to Paul William Sebring, of the United States Air Force… Paul could not recall any ceremony. He had heard he'd been married, but did not know to whom. He had shared in the whisky and Sparkling Burgundy, had been taken back to camp after the day's outing, and had moved with his unit for New Guinea at 2 a.m.vi
Or when, in 1950, Stuart Tomkins was bought to Court after having: Sparkling Burgundy with his dinner and a collision with a tram.“ He was charged with having driven under the influence of liquor and fined £20 and his licence was cancelled. vii
While our newspapers (mostly) only record tales of woe and human folly, they also record the vineyards promoting sales:  Bests Great Western in 1941 were offering their Sparkling Burgundy – Wholesale - thirty shillings per doz in quart bottles – eighteen shillings per doz in pint bottles.viii
Despite this limited production during these quiet years, the quality of the wine making was not affected, The Seppelt Show Sparkling Burgundies, made by Colin Preece winemaker 1932 to 1963, particularly the vintages 1944 and 1946, have become legendary wines and on the very rare occasions they appear at auction, attract huge prices. The 1964 and a few others from that decade are similarly revered.
“Re-Discovery” in the 1980’s.
In most articles and general wine histories the story is that in the 1980’s, Sparkling Red had long disappeared, when Seppelt winemaker Ian MacKenzie found racks of old wines from 1940 to 1960 simply resting untouched in the Seppelt Drives, quietly minding their own business; he tried a few and was blown away. As well as arranging to release these old vintages, he immediately allocated some of the estate’s best shiraz to reviving the style.
However, whatever nuggets of truth are buried within this story, “Sparkling Red” was, and still is, extremely common in northern Victoria and especially so in South Australia, and had been since it was first introduced in the late 1800’s, as noted in the various references and advertising found in newspapers over time. Local popularity in South Australia, was to the point, that it could be purchased by the glass in any Adelaide hotel public bar: a number of hotels, such as the Arab Steed Hotel in Hutt Road, which served a sparkling red, sourced from McLaren Vale, that had been labelled with the Hotel’s own logo ix. Common availability in a public bar does not suddenly appear, it develops over time though demand; nor does this availability as a “worker’s drink” necessarily register on the radar of the wine connoisseur. This traditional public bar availability only started to fade and become at bit less common as we went further into the 21st century and more and more of the older hotels were being renovated – though Sparkling Red is till commonly available at contemporary licensed premises, restaurants and at temporary Adelaide Arts Festival outlets, such as the Festival Fringe venue, Garden of Un-earthly Delights. In other Australian States, the availability of Sparkling Red varied over time, in Sydney between the 1960’s to1980’s it was virtually impossible to find anywhere. By the end of 1990’s to 2015, Liquor outlets tended to carry more and more labels, peaking at approximately 20. Availability has again started to fade and currently in 2025, at a popular liqour outlet such as Dan Murphy, there are only approximately ten labels, in the main at the lower to mid-level price range. It has been and still is very rare for the style to be available in restaurants in States other than South Australia, and to a lesser extent Victoria..
However there is no doubt that from the 1980’s Sparkling Red, helped by a reputation as a distinctive Australian wine, started to receive recognition around the country and the attention of many more winemakers. Around Australia various vineyards now make versions, from Frazer Woods’ in Margaret River West Australia to Queensland’s Granite Ridge via Hungerford Hill in the Hunter Valley in New South Wales. As most of these contemporary Sparkling Red wines only sell via cellar door it is hard to quantify the exact number of labels. Though Wine Guide Australia suggests that as production, storage and additional handling means they’re not as profitable as still wines, it is only the winemakers who are truly in love with the style, who produce them; as such there are only around 60 wineries in Australia making this varietal.x
I would suggest that this figure of 60 producers, is conservative, on the basis that at one point a few years ago, on a visit to the Adelaide Central Markets, that mecca for all the best produce that South Australia has to offer, in the wine retail shop, trying to decide on which to purchase, I counted 53 Sparkling Red wines, all of which were from South Australian vineyards.
Production of sparkling wine
The base for making any sparkling wine can be either a red, white or Rose wine, stabilised and cleared to a stage when it would normally be ready for bottling. There are three basic methods for producing sparkling wine:
1. Carbonation
When ready for bottling the base wine is chilled and carbon dioxide is injected under pressure during bottling. It is the simplest and cheapest but on release of the cork the sparkling nature quickly disappears.
2. Charmat Method
The base wine is placed into large pressurised tanks and a small preparation of sweetening and yeast starter is added to commence primary fermentation. Under pressure the carbon dioxide remains dissolved in the wine. When completed the now sparkling wine is sterile filtered and bottled under pressure. The majority of sparkling wines in all countries are made in this manner.
3. Champenois
This method is used to produce the best quality sparkling wine, using the finest base wine available. The following process is used generally but individual winemakers use slight modifications to suit their own style, conditions and grapes:
- Blending (Coupage) - Considerable care is taken to blend base wines, the same care that is taken in the production of quality red vintages to the bottling stage of production. The grapes can be from an individual block of vines or blends from different areas or grape varieties.
- Sweetening and Yeast ( Liqueur de Tirage) - Sugar, usually cane sugar, is used to sweeten the base wine and a yeast culture added to start fermentation.
- Bottle Fermentation - The wine is placed into special “champagne” bottles, which are corked and wired, and placed on their side at a temperature of 5 to 8 degrees Centigrade, in long stacks and left to ferment and mature for a period of years – up to ten years or more in the case of Seppelt Show Sparkling Shiraz and up to two years for Majella Sparkling Red. At about 6 monthly intervals the bottles are shaken to keep the lees from settling.
- Clearing ( Remuage) - Bottles are placed on specially designed shaking-tables called Pupitres. On these the bottle position is changed from almost horizontal to upside-down. Each day for three or four weeks every bottle is gently shaken and turned slightly to force the sediment into the neck of the bottle to rest firmly against the cork.
- Recorking ( Dégorgement ) - The deposited lees are removed from the wine either by removing the cork while rapidly moving the bottle from upside-down to upright – a technique requiring much practice and skill, especially in minimising the amount of wine lost. The most common practice today is by freezing the contents in the neck of the bottle then, using a special tool, remove the upper layer of frozen wine in which the impurities are trapped.
- Sweetening and final corking ( Dosage ) - The wine lost is replaced with a liqueur d’expédition usually consisting of a brandy based wine, along with, depending on final sweetness the winemaker requires, a small amount of honey or sugar. A regular “Champagne” cork is now inserted and wired.
The aim is usually to balance the dosage against the acidity so that sweetness disappears as well assisting gas development. These components, along with a base wine made from fully ripe fruit and softened by some years in wood, allow vintage sparkling reds to gain complexity and retain fruit freshness over long bottle age.
- Bottle Age - The bottle is then placed in the cellar for bottle-ageing; depending on the winemaker, this maybe from 12 to 18 months or for a top of the range bottle-fermented sparkling red wine, up to ten or more years before reaching the market - Seppelt have, earlier in 2025, released their 2012 Sparkling Show Shiraz.xi
Food Matching.
Sparkling Shiraz is best served a little chilled. This is to slightly soften and round out its inborn intensity. It is versatile and tends to go well with Asian food as well as Duck, Quail or game meats such as Hare; Christmas and turkey have become a natural pairing; Dr. David Carpenter at Lark Hill Winery maintains, a top quality Sparkling Burgundy with turkey is one of the best marriages of food and wine.xii; If you like to stick to tradition, pair Sparkling Red with a classic roast and clove-studded ham. Then on Boxing Day, bring out the left-over ham and turkey and pop another Sparkling Red.
It’s also superb served with barbequed ribs, Chinese roast duck and chocolate desserts, or, as winemaker Kym Teusner says about their MC Sparkling Shiraz:  Built for Bacon’...that could well apply to most of the staff here at Teusner Wines but we believe that Sparkling Shiraz came into being as early man began to ponder the age old question... “What to drink with breakfast. xiii


Some people are not satisfied with just food matching :
Grand corona sized Habanos Specialist release. Opened with lovely caramel, some woody notes, with a hint of chocolate emerging. , a lovely cigar. Matched it with the Seppelt Show Reserve Sparkling Shiraz 2008 and they really worked well together. Flavours melded nicely. xiv
Some menus from South Australian Restaurants:
Fino Restaurant Seppeltsfield - recorded by Soi.38 Thai restaurant co-owner Jacqui Lim in 2015 The menu items tasted included: crispy Sardines, Prawns, garlic, chilli and parsley, smoked Kingfish with seaweed, brown rice and sesame, slow cooked Lamb shoulder, carrots, pickled chilli and yoghurt and Barossa Chicken, broad bean and almond. The selected wine was a Teusner MC 2009 Sparkling Shiraz from Barossa Valley. xv Huon Hooke’s tasting notes for Teusner Sparkling Shiraz: Deep red tinged with purple,and it has a voluminious bouquet of liquorice, plum, and fruitcake with a trace of coconut. A big rich generous style of sparkling shiraz with a touch of opulence, ripe flavuors and very soft but present tannins. Sweetness is nicely balanced. A top example of the style. xvi.

References

i A very fine lot of sparkling red wines of the Burgundy Style The Advertiser (Adelaide) August 31 1914 https://trove.nla.gov.au/
ii Bordeaux Exhibition Evening Observer (Brisbane) October 14 1895 https://trove.nla.gov.au/
iii Seppelts Sparkling Burgundy Sunday Times (Perth) October 20 1929 https://trove.nla.gov.au
iv The Premier in Dreamland Freeman’s Journal (Sydney) June 151895  https://trove.nla.gov.au/
v Max Dingle. Personal recollections of the Author. Gathered over time from annual visits to Adelaide from the late 1960’s to the present. October 15 2025.
vi Bob Slessor “Married” The Daily Telegraph (Sydney) July 2 1944 https://trove.nla.gov.au/
vii Dined and Wined The Barrier Miner ( Broken Hill) November 15 1950 https://trove.nla.gov.au/
viii Bests Great Western Sparkling Burgundy The Australian Jewish Herald (Melbourne) October 2 1941 https://trove.nla.gov.au
ix Ibid., Max Dingle October 15 2025
x Sparkling Shiraz Wine Guide Australia October 20 2025 https://wineguideaustralia.com/sparkling-shiraz/
xi David Jackson and Danny Schuster Grape Growing and Wine Making (Martinborough NZ, Alister Taylor Publishing Ltd, 1981), 150.
xii Down Under turkey, with fizz. Canberra Times (Canberra) December 20 1995 https://trove.nla.gov.au/
xiii Built for Bacon Teusner Wines October 25 2025 https://teusner.com.au/collections/all/products/teusner-mc-sparkling-shiraz-2020
xiv Ken Gargett Punch Punch 48 – Sepplets Show Reserve Sparkling Shiraz 2008, Kenfessions 2020, October 25 2025 https://www.kenfessions.com/articles/punch-punch-48-seppelt-show-reserve-sparkling-shiraz-2008nbsp-ken-gargett-10-2020
xv Jacqui Lim Fino Sepplefield Barossa Valley November 8 2015, https://jacquisfoodfetish.com.au/2015/11/08/fino-seppeltsfield-barossa-valley/
xvi Huon Hooke MC 2020 Sparkling Shiraz October 15 2023 https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0792/8024/2993/files/Teusner_Tasting_Notes_MC_Sparkling_Shiraz_20.pdf?v=1730072925

Maggie Beer’s Pheasant Farm Restaurant c.1983 - 1993
The menu highlighted the produce from Pheasant Farm as well as the food and wines from the Barossa Valley. Items such as these listed in a 1985 lunch menu: pheasant breast with beetroot,, pasta with smoked kangaroo, squab with pigeon livers, rabbit with anchovy mayonnaise and Goats cheese with olives and pancetta are all an ideal match with the Charles Melton Sparkling Burgundy recommended. i
Sparkling Red Tasting Notes - In 1985 the first Charles Melton Sparkling Burgundy from the Barossa, had just been released.(now named NV Sparkling Red - during the 1980’s Australia wines stopped using French terms such as Burgundy and Hermitage.): Lovely deep burgundy colour. Beautifully clean and sweet lift on the nose. A mix of fragrant red fruits and sweet spices. A very fine tongue coating mousse with some apparent sweetness (necessary for a long ageing traditional sparkling burgundy style) that is finely balanced by some just evident tanins. ii.

Tasting / Reviews.
There is no doubt that for a lot of people the pouring of a Sparkling Red is made enticing by the pink effervescent mousse or bubbles, on the deep red of the wine, but for others, a big appeal lies in the complexity that bottle age imparts.
Shiraz is by far the most widely used Sparkling Red variety in Australia, as its soft tannins are ideally suited. Different regions impart different qualities depending on the variety used in its making, but Sparkling Red wines:
...are typically very ripe and rely on rich fruit characters, combined usually with a slight degree of sweetness, balanced against acidity, to achieve their impact. In their youth they are deep, crimson red in colour, vibrantly fruit-driven, really juicy and surprisingly refreshing when served chilled.iii
Seppelt Show Sparkling Burgundies 1944 -1991
James Halliday has noted:
...up to 1967 the base wine varied between 100% Great Western shiraz and a veritable cocktail; from 1972 onwards all the wines have been made entirely from Great Western shiraz – more particularly, from the block of very old vines adjacent to the winery. A battle royal is waged between the team responsible for the Shiraz (dry red) and that responsible for the Sparkling Burgundy, each wanting the lion’s share of the grapes.
That tug-of-war underlies the fact that Sparkling Burgundies are far closer to conventional red wines than are their white counterparts. This similarity becomes more and more pronounced as the wines age and lose their gas; indeed many bottles of the ’44 and ’46 have next to no visible CO2, and it is only a very faint prickle on the tongue. Yet the gas has played an essential role in preserving fruit freshness: these are glorious renditions of old shiraz. I would not hesitate to cellar the new show reserve wines which are disgorges after 10 years on yeast lees and released at that age. They will only get better and better.
In the tasting held in 1994, the notes on vintages from 1944 to 1991 gave all vintages a top of the range five star rating except ’63, ’72, ’83, ’87, ’90 and ’91 at four and a half stars and only one, ’67 at three and half stars.iv

Jeremy Oliver notes that: Seppelt Show Sparkling Shiraz (nee Burgundy) vintages 1972 – 1987 are all ranked Gold. While Seppelt Original Sparkling Shiraz (nee Harpers Range Sparkling Burgundy), vintages 1985 to 1993 are all ranked Silver. v

It is not only the major wine Companies and vineyards who maintain production today. Small vineyards, especially in Northern Victoria and in South Australia, also maintain tradition:
Cape Horn Vineyard, Echuca, has something special for wine lovers. Released this month, its special limited vintage — the sparkling shiraz durif 1998 - is sure to be pure pleasure to the taste buds. This quality wine is from shiraz and durif vines planted at the Cape Horn vineyard on the Murray River in 1880’s. There is only a limited supply, as only a couple of tonne of grapes were set aside. This wine is guaranteed to make your New Year's Eve party a hit, suited to warm weather and sure to cool down your dry palate. Vineyard owner Ian Harrison said he was pleased with the wine.
"The shiraz is a full bodied dry sparkling red wine that has a lovely fruit flavor," he said. "It is a chilled red wine that will mature in the bottle and only get better.”vi

Majella Sparkling Shiraz - A tasting of Majella Sparkling Shiraz 2023 was offered at the conclusion of this paper. Notes from the winemaker:
The base wine of our Sparkling Shiraz is matured in 2nd and 3rd use French oak hogsheads for five months before undergoing secondary fermentation in the bottle. The wine remains on lees for 14 months and, using méthode traditionnelle, the bottles are hand-riddled, then disgorged. A small amount of vintage port is added for extra complexity.

• Colour: Vibrant dark red with a bright ruby hue and a fine bead
• Bouquet: Fresh plum, raspberry, and blackberry aromas
• Palate: Smooth and luscious, with black fruit characters, a hint of spice, gentle tannins, and a generous finish
• When to Drink: Enjoy now or cellar up to 10 years
• Food Match: Pairs beautifully with roasts, barbecued meats, and even a classic bacon and eggs breakfast’. vii

Max Dingle OAM
November 2025
Symposium of Gastronomy and Food History - Napier

References

i Maggie Beer Pheasant Farm Restaurant Menu (Barossa Valley 1985) Max Dingle Gastronomy Archive October 2025
ii Charles Melton NV Sparkling Red October 30 2025 https://charlesmeltonwines.com.au/product/sparkling-red/
iii What is Sparkling Red ? Wine Wine Selectors May 17 2023 https://www.wineselectors.com.au/wine-varieties/sparkling-red?srsltid=AfmBOoqpz0RNZn74OuoeFbONAUiLimZ_7YSTjM2th27ZBWA3_VZIOfwy
iv James Halliday Classic Wines of Australia (Sydney Harper Collins 1997) 262.
v Jeremy Oliver The On Wine Australian Wine Annual 1999 (Adelaide Griffin Press 1998) 259.
vi “Something Special” The Riverine Herald (Ecucha Vic ) December 27 2000
vii Bruce Gregory & Michael Marcus Sparkling Shiraz, Majella Coonawarra, October 30 2025 https://www.majellawines.com.au/wines/sparkling-shiraz

Death, funerals and food practices, as well as the reasons for funeral feasting vary widely throughout history and across cultures. This paper gives a brief overview of various funeral food practices and traditions over time, mostly from a “western” perspective. As is appropriate with endings, it finishes with contemplation of a funeral ‘feast’, the preferred food and wine to be served at my wake.

The oldest funeral feasts - While there is some speculation about earlier burial site findings, the remains of 71 roasted tortoises found interred with the bones of a woman, and in another grave site, the bones of two butchered and roasted wild cattle, seem to be the oldest and best documented feasts accompanying burial of the dead. These 12,000 year old middle-eastern graves were associated with a community on the verge of changing from nomadic to an agricultural life and it is speculated that the feasts were either means of joining people together, a source of community grief, or, as not all graves included evidence of feasts, a reinforcement and show of power by leading families.

In classical literary sources such as the Bible, feasting at funerals seems to be a two way bet. Ecclesiastes suggests that: It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to go to the house of feasting: for that is the end of all men; and the living will lay it to his heart. i
While Jeremiah, in criticising a particular group of people, suggests, that feasting at their funeral is too honourable to be even contemplated. ii
In Homer’s Iliad, Achilles mourns Patroclus:
His soldiers took off their burnished bronze equipment, unyoked their neighing horses, and sat down in their hundreds beside the ship of the swift son of Peleus, who produced for them a delicious funeral feast. Many a white ox fell with his last gasp to the iron knife, many a sheep and bleating goat was slaughtered, and many a fine fat hog was stretched across the flames to have his bristles singed. Cupfuls of blood were poured all around the corpse.iii
Herodotus in his Histories, notes that in Egypt at feasts, in a practice that foreshadows death and a funeral : They eat loaves made from spelt and wine from barley, as they have no vines in the country. Some kinds of fish are eaten raw, either dried in the sun, or salted; quails too they eat raw, ducks and various small birds, after pickling them in brine; other sorts of birds and fish, apart from those considered sacred, they either roast or boil. When the rich give a feast and the meal is finished, a man carries round amongst the guests, a wooden image of a corpse in a coffin, carved and painted to look as real as possible,. It is shown to each guest in turn while saying. “ Look upon this as you drink and enjoy yourself; for you will be like this when you die. iv

Apart from food provided in the tomb for the departed’s journey, there seem to be a number of food rituals centered around Egyptian funerals. The New York Metropolitan Museum’s neat detective work on a collection of large pottery jars, broken pottery, animal bones and mud seals of King Tutankhamen, which Theodore Davis had discovered in a separate pit near the entrance to the Royal tomb and donated to the fledgling Museum collection in 1909, revealed that a meal took place with the rites performed for the deceased’s statue that provided a place of materialisation for a dead person’s soul. These statue rites are repeatedly depicted in reliefs and paintings as being enacted in a garden setting, with food offerings set out on tables and drinks in large jars like those in the Davis collection. All the evidence indicated that the collection items were part of a display of food offerings set out at the consecration of a statue of Tutankhamen. As was customary in antiquity, the participants in the offering ritual would have consumed the food after the ceremonies were concluded, and the utensils, jars and plates broken and, along with the food remains, buried at the site of the ceremony. v

During Roman times, the mourning and solemnities connected with the dead lasted for nine days after the funeral, at the end of which time a sacrifice was performed. A feast given in honour of the dead, sometimes appears to have been given at the time of the funeral, sometimes at the sacrifice and other times at a later date.
​The richer the family and more prestigious the person, the greater the activities in honour of the deceased. Funeral rites could include a feast for friends and relatives, distribution of food to the people, a public banquet as well as gladiatorial combat and other games. Thus at the funeral of P. Licinius Crassus, who had been Pontifex Maximus, fresh cuts of meat were distributed, one hundred and twenty gladiators fought, and three days of funeral games were celebrated; at the end of which a public banquet was given in the forum. Sometimes these funeral rites and games were repeated on the anniversary of the person’s death. vi

Medieval funeral traditions, mainly feasts and distribution of food or alms, were a carry-over from to those that developed through Roman times. In England it was common for wills or the executors of the estate, to make provision for funerals and feasts. In a documented funeral quoted by Chris Woolgar, the costs indicate that 554 loaves of bread, 357 gallons of cider and one and a half carcasses of beef were consumed. Quantities which seem to indicate that some 500 people would have taken part in the funeral feast. Distributions to the poor attending funerals were sometimes made in cash rather than as food. In 1412, Alexander Tottington, Bishop of Norwich, left £20 to be distributed to the poor on the day of his burial – as the will specified denariatim – i.e. a penny to each person – 4800 people benefited from the Bishop’s largesse. vii

Over time, these very generous feasts gradually diminished in quantity and in the numbers of participants. While in the seventeenth century the funeral feast for the wealthy still offered an expensive variety of meats, pickles, creams and cakes, by the nineteenth the arrangements had become more modest.
Early in 19th Century Britain, the emergence of a financially stable middle class, came with improved life expectancy. Early deaths were viewed increasingly as tragic and deserving of elaborate and grand-scale mourning. Funeral and mourning practices were further ritualized after 1861when Queen Victoria’s husband, Prince Consort Alfred, died. She went into deep mourning for the remainder of her life and set a precedent which many of her British subjects followed. Death practices (and related superstitions) became more elaborate as the century progressed; however, toward the end of the 1800s, the ostentatious show had begun to diminish, and by the 1890s, funerary practices were relegated to a prescribed set of social rules. viii
A feast was held at the home of the deceased; sometimes after the funeral, but sometimes before the funeral with the body being present. Ham, cider, ale, pies and cakes were the usual fare for middle class families. Formal invitations were sent and in attendance would be both the immediate and extended family as well friends and business associates. ix Working- class funerals were much more basic with funeral foods such as crispy sponge fingers or “coffins,” oatcake, and caraway shortcake. x
Though some were very simple; as in James Joyce’s short story, ‘The Sisters’, set c.1900:
We crossed ourselves and came away. In the little room downstairs we found Eliza seated in his armchair … while Nannie went to the sideboard and bought out a decanter of sherry and some wineglasses. She set these on the table and invited us to take a glass of wine. Then at her sister’s bidding, she filled out the sherry into the glasses and handed them to us. She pressed me to take some cream crackers also, but I declined because I thought I would make too much noise eating them. She seemed to be somewhat disappointed and went over quietly to the sofa, where she sat down behind her sister.
No one spoke: we all gazed at the empty fireplace.
My Aunt waited until Eliza sighed and then said:
‘Ah, well, he’s gone to a better world.’ xi

Speaking of sherry. Alcoholic drink, from ale, wine, whisky to Swedish funeral Glogg, has long played a role in the funeral wake, ubiquitous to the point of riotious behaviour, and the “merry” Irish Wake is almost a cliché; in the 1600’s the wake was called “the drinking”; At the drinking following a gentlewoman’s funeral in Abingdon in 1641 literally gallons of sack, white wine, and claret were served. xii As a result of drunken and ‘unchristian’ behaviour at drinkings: ...young lads and lasses romp with one another, and when the fathers and mothers are at last overcome with sleep and whiskey, the youth become more enterprising, and are frequently successful. xiii
In 1660 the Synod of Tuam unsuccessfully attempted to rid wakes of alcoholic drink; including instruction of Clergy at wakes ‘to ensure that death was uppermost in the minds of those who attended’. xiv In fact the bacchanal continued for hundreds of years and, happily still has not entirely disappeared: There is something deeply pagan in these practices, harkening back to the cycles of the earth, not of sin and heaven or hell, but of death and life in a grand circle; while honouring the passing of a revered member of the community and at the same time celebrating that it’s not your time quite yet. xv

A brief look at some other traditions
In a number of Asian countries rice is a symbol of life and is included in all funerals. Baskets of fruit and vegetables are gifted to families, while eating chicken symbolically helps the soul of the dead to fly to heaven. Sugar, in the form of sweets/candies, handed out after a funeral, is meant to purify mourners after coming into contact with the dead.

In parts of Aboriginal Australia, some recorded historical funeral practices have included: covering the deceased with red ochre, painting clan and linguistic group totemic patterns on the face, chest and abdomen of the body. While a feast may held, no food is set aside for the spirit, in the hope it will be compelled to leave the earthly surroundings it is familiar with. To assist in the driving away of the spirit, the mourners brush themselves with smoking green leaves to purify themselves. The deceased is placed on a specially prepared platform and a small fire is lit under the platform so that the spirit can hunt and cook their own food. xvi

Inuit, the indigenous people in the arctic regions of North America have a whole of nature approach to life and believe the earth, the sea, the plants, and the animals are all part of the divine; belong to the whole, and live in brotherhood with all living beings. In their minds dying is just a crossing from the physical world to the spiritual world. Every being, whether human, animal, or vegetable, has a soul or a breath that lasts after death. The name of the dead person is not used until a newborn is given that name; from this time the deceased continues to live both through the living being and within the other worlds. xvii
Grief support is mainly given prior to death and may include hunters bringing food to the home, women offering support for cooking and cleaning, and people accompanying the family by simply being present. 
After death the mourning period lasts five days, rituals during this period include emptying the dead person’s house, purifying it through cleaning and fumigation and particular food items are not eaten. For the community the grieving ends with the burial service. As noted by one Inuk woman; people are usually very helpful prior to and during the funeral, bringing food and making sure the funeral service and burial run smoothly: “People are very good about that… though once the body is buried, it's like, they’ve done their part; that's it.” xviii 

In our present - Apart from the funerals of heads of state and celebrities, whose expensive funerals are more a photo and social media opportunity for the attendees and do not involve any public meals or alms giving, our society has experienced a gradual demise of formal community funerary rituals, although the funeral meal, a “wake”, is still reasonably common within the family, albeit held after the burial service, more in the form of a “cocktail” function, alcoholic beverages and finger food, rather than a meal as such.
In checking numerous websites for companies that cater for such gatherings the main criterion for developing the menu is for an ‘informal’ function where guests stand and mingle with friends and family. Invariably finger food is recommended as a simple and easy way to feed groups. No thought appears to be given to offering to develop an individual menu that would reflect the likes or recall memories of the departed. This demise of ritual, some think, brings with it psychological and social impoverishment, for the immediate bereaved and the larger social community. However the holding of a wake, and associated food, that still happens, function as a group experience and can help focus on the needs of the living. xix
Also across cultures, food is sometimes provided by friends for the family of the deceased. Bread, casseroles, noodles, soup and cakes are delivered to the house of the mourners to provide substance, comfort, and to let those that have lost a family member know they are loved. As well, in a number of cultures, particularly in Latin America, the mourners provide food to be “shared” with the deceased. Latin America, their art, food and festivities surrounding Day of the Dead is of particular appeal, because it is about life and that death is just a part of life.
Dia de los muertos
The day of the dead, is a celebration held all over Latin America but has its roots in the indigenous Aztec culture of Mexico, in the beliefs and ceremonies surrounding Lady Death.
Lady Death, guards the bones of the dead until they can be reused in another life. As well, once a year, she allows the spirits of the dead to rejoin the living, for the family to remember departed loved ones and remind us all that death is a part of life.
After the Spanish invasion, the Catholic religion failed in their attempts to totally destroy that culture and Lady Death resurrected herself in the Day of the Dead Celebrations now held on the Catholic feast days of All Saints and All Souls.
November 1st is the Day of the Little Angels, when the spirits of departed children visit their families. All children are considered innocent and ascend into heaven at death, to become angels and the souls of children are so eager to return they arrive a whole day ahead of the adults. They are welcomed with lots of candies, sugar skulls and their beloved toys.
The spirits of departed adults return on 2nd November and public celebrations include street parades, with participants in elaborate costumes wearing make-up or masks in the form of grinning skulls, the symbol of Lady Death. The colour for festivities is orange and Marigold flowers abound, forming garlands and decorations for people, food, altars, graves and streets.
As with the little angels, the spirits are welcomed in family homes and at grave sites with small altars decorated with photographs of the dead, lighted candles, food that the person loved and enjoyed when they were alive, such as corn, tamales, chocolate, caramel flan and a special Pan de Muerto, baked for the day of festivities. This bread of the dead is flavoured with sugar, anise seeds and orange zest. and typically made in a particular shape, with pieces forming a cross to symbolize the bones of the dead, while on top is a small ball, which some say is a teardrop, representing the tears shed.
The food and the Pan de Muerto is an offering made to the departed loved one, whose spirit is nourished by the “essence” of the offerings, while the family members are physically nourished by eating the bread and other food.
Ultimately the celebration is a happy one, for while a departed child is a sad loss, the family has gained an angel and the adult departed remain a part of the family, as they are only truly dead when they are forgotten. xx

A Funeral Feast
Death never really intruded into my world until I was about 18 when I drove my father to the funeral of his brother. Even then, as I got lost driving around the streets of suburban Brisbane, we only went to the wake which seemed like a family get together with cakes and beer. Nothing remotely like the Mexican Day of the Dead festivities happened in my immediate family nor in the culture I was raised in; Once a person died and was buried, it was an exception for anyone to even visit a grave let alone remember the dead on a regular basis.
Thinking about my own funeral, the wake and the menu that should be served; developing a menu would need to take into account today’s community idea of what constitutes a wake and the expectation that the executor of the estate would opt for the cocktail function approach, rather than a full blown feast; The latter would be rather fun, but would possibly be difficult to bring off - while a catering firm could do such a feast there always seems to be a too “professional” touch, at least not fitting with my (current) idea of entertaining people with a banquet cooked at home. Plus on the personal front the lack of anyone really close with the capability and willingness to take the responsibility of hosting and cooking such a funeral feast.
As well, an awareness that …good food has a remarkable potential to cut through our existential anxieties and… as our hearts and minds tell us all is dreadful, our mouths can whisper ‘Yes, but the pizza is still delicious.’... xxi
My preference would be that the food served at my wake reflected my enjoyment of eating, including particular tastes, textures and styles. So a menu for the food to be served has been developed from various likes and food habits. A process that was best started in looking at celebrations such as Christmas. Where the main dish for my Christmas is, invariably, duck with a fruit sauce, whichever fruit is ready for picking in the garden, and the wine, in that great South Australian tradition, a cold sparkling red wine on a summer day, is usually Seppelt’s Vintage Sparkling Shiraz.
Favoured foods are usually served simply and can incorporate spices and flavours from various cultural traditions; to take the duck as an example, rather than using a direct French influence, combining this with Chinese and Mexican influences would reflect my home style of cooking; wherein a serve would consist of small portions of crisp skin and rare meat from pan /grilled breast along with a slight touch of poached fruit, wrapped in pancakes that have a hint of anise and orange, as in the Mexican Pan de Muerto.
Menu items can also be developed from a list of foods and influences that I love, which could include : Chinese, Mediterranean, seafood, hand cut chips, eggplant, rhubarb, olives, cheese, oat biscuits, olive oil, sourdough bread and fresh fruit.
The following proposed menu was developed from these ideas. It was then tested, by Michael Guiliano and Max Dingle in September 2024, to great success. The recipes prepared, cooked and flavourings adjusted. xxii A number of sparkling red wine varieties were tasted; during the course of which it was discovered that handmade dumplings, even if the shapes and contents started varying considerably, do not lose their appeal, in fact everything seemed to improve in line with the number of wines tasted.

Funeral Food    -     Menu for a Wake
Waiter Service:
Deep fried tripe
(Thin strips of very tender, honeycomb tripe, cooked a la Lyonnaise or Chinese (ginger, green onion, Anise, Soy) dipped in tempura batter and deep fried )
Hand-cut Chips
(Deep fried served in small newspaper cups)
Beetroot dumplings
(Smashed beetroot, salted butter, finely grated rind of an orange, pepper, gow gee pastry - Steamed)
Pea and prawn dumplings
(Mashed peas, diced prawn, salted garlic butter, dash of lemon juice, gow gee pastry - Steamed)
Spiced eggplant dumplings
(Eggplant puree, salt, pepper, sumac, touch of chilli, gow gee pastry - Fried)
Duck pancakes
(Thinly sliced pan / grilled rare Duck breasts, a touch of poached seasonal fruit eg blackberry or plum, wrapped in anise and orange pancakes)
Rhubarb Custard Tarts
(Shortcrust pastry, layer of roast rhubarb covered in Greek Galaktoboureko )
Sparkling Red wine
Self serve :
Olives
Whole Brie with oat biscuits
Platters of fresh fruit
(one of watermelon cubes with raspberries, strawberries dressed in a light rosewater sugar syrup, one of sweet orange segments.)
Funeral Biscuits
( Almond shortbread biscuits - in small boxes, each box with a limited edition inkjet print; from the Funeral Series – Emotional Body by Max Dingle - Consisting of 12 works each in an edition of 3 prints) xxiii
Coffee, tea, water

NOTES
i Anon Bible, King James Version Ecclesiastes 7:2-3
ii https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Jeremiah%2012-16&version=NIV Do not enter a house where there is a funeral meal… No one will offer food to comfort those who mourn for the dead—not even for a father or a mother—nor will anyone give them a drink to console them.
iii Homer The Iliad 1950 Penguin
iv Herodotus The Histories 1960 Penguin Classics
v https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/tuta/hd_tuta.htm 2010 Dorothea Arnold
vi https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA*/Funus.html Roman Funerals
vii Woolgar Chris Eating, drinking and the dead in late medieval England 2019 Journal : Leidschrift Vol 34 Scholarly Publications Leiden University
viii https://victorianmonsters.wordpress.com/victorian-funerary-practices/
ix https://www.morbidoutlook.com/nonfiction/articles/2003_04_vicdeath.html
x Frisby Helen Victorian Funeral Food Customs 2019 Victorian Review Vol 45 No 2 John Hopkins University
xi Joyce James Dubliners 1956 Penguin
xii Gittings Clare & Jupp Peter Death in England 1999 Manchester University Press
xiii Lysaght, Patricia, Hospitality at wakes and funerals in Ireland 17th -19th Century 2003 Folklore Journal
xiv Lysaght, Patricia, Hospitality at wakes and funerals in Ireland 17th -19th Century 2003 Folklore Journal
xv https://blackthornandstone.com/2020/05/28/dancing-with-death-a-short-history-of-funeral-feasts-merry-wakes/ Dr Romany Reagan
xvi https://austhrutime.com/aboriginal_mortuary_rites_platform.htm W H Munroe
xvii https://peuplesautochtones.com/inuit-people-funeral-rites/
xviii https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/13634615221135423
xix Yoder Lonnie The Funeral Meal 1986 Journal of Religion and Health Vol 25 No 2 Springer
xx Max Dingle OAM Death Love – Art 2023 Exhibition text, Shoalhaven Regional Gallery
xxi Julian Baggini The Virtues of the Table 2014 Granta Publications
xxii As both people involved in the test cooking were experienced cooks, no detailed written recipes were used or noted, as ingredients and cooking times for all items on the menu were considered self evident. In retrospect, rather than doing almost everything from scratch, there are a few prepared ingredients that can be purchased from a good grocery or supermarket, especially those specialising in Asian foods – BBQ duck, Dim Sum cooked honeycomb tripe, dumpling wrappers, frozen pastry, biscuits, oat and shortbread.
xxiii Fave Dei Morti
These traditional Italian cookies are not just reserved for funerals, but they are also baked every November 2 – All Souls’ Day – and are meant to serve as transport for the souls of the dead. 
Ingredients
·         7 ounces (200 grams) almonds or almond meal
·         3/4 cups (100 grams) flour
·         1/2 cup (100 grams) sugar
·         1 medium-large egg
·         2 tablespoons (30 grams) butter
·         1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
·         1 shot Grappa ( brandy, rum, gin or other is OK)
1.   Combine all the ingredients together until you have a smooth, compact dough. If it is too crumbly, add some warm water, a very little bit at a time until the dough comes together.
2.   Roll walnut-sized pieces of dough into balls and place on a lined baking tray. Flatten each ball into a disc and bake at 350°F for 10-15 minutes or until dry to the touch and hardened but not too browned. Once cool, keep in an air tight container.

A Short History of Art and Subversion in the 20th Century
I am usually happy to tell stories associated with my art, and somewhat reluctant to explain in detail the inspiration behind the making of an artwork, such as this mixed media sculpture, because I think art is a personal matter and the meaning within a work, should be the meaning that the viewer thinks about at the time.
However, with Perspective Lovesong , over an afternoon tea, I was rabbiting on about the inspiration behind the making; as the thinking and process of making was reasonably complex, I, in part to sort it out in my own mind, offer this:
In the first instance, a good friend, gifted artist and designer, Natalie McDonagh, presented me with a number of small rubber hands, one of which was fashioned into a surreal adornment. After these sat around for something like two years in my chaotic studio while I pondered, then earlier this year, while re-reading some Ern Malley poems, the creative urge started, and the sculpture was completed within a few days.
The inspirational foundation on which works are developed is the Dada movement from the early 1900’s.
Dada’s subversive and revolutionary ideals emerged from the activities of a small group of artists and poets in Zurich, eventually cohering into a set of strategies and philosophies adopted by a loose international network of artists aiming to create new forms of visual art, performance, and poetry as well as alternative visions of the world. These artists disillusioned by war merely confirmed the degradation of social structures that led to such violence: corrupt and nationalist politics, repressive social values, and unquestioning conformity of culture and thought. From 1916 until the mid-1920s, artists in Zurich, New York, Cologne, Hanover, and Paris declared an all-out assault against not only on conventional definitions of art, but on rational thought itself. “The beginnings of Dada,” poet Tristan Tzara recalled, “were not the beginnings of art, but of disgust.”
Museum of Modern Art, New York - website 2023

From there the work was influenced by, and named after, a poem by Ern Malley. A quote from the editorial of Ern Malley’s Journal Vol.1 No.3 October 1953 Editors Max Harris, John Reed, Barry Reid.
... he was a poet who was born and who died in 1944, the brain-child of two other poets, James McAuley and Harold Stewart, and foisted by them on Max Harris and John Reed as editors of the journal “Angry Penguins”. They enthusiastically accepted him and his poems and published his entire literary output in a special issue of “Angry Penguins”. McAuley and Stewart then revealed the “hoax” amid great applause from the Press, which only too readily endorsed the authors’ claim that the poems were all nonsense. “Angry Penguins” however stuck to its judgement that, irrespective of intention, the poems were quite outstanding, and in its next issue published a long series of supporting opinions from writers and critics both here and overseas. The anticlimax came when Max Harris was prosecuted in Adelaide on the basis that the poems were obscene publications. He was convicted and fined $5.
This great literary hoax by traditional poets aimed at subverting the modernist movement, is still alive today after having spawned journals, books, films, paintings and of course poetry. A considerable number of these are convinced that, while not conceived as such, the poems are in the main, outstanding examples of modernist poetry.

Another writer Anais Nin, who, along with other artists including author Henry Miller and poet Robert Duncan, while living in Paris, during the 1940’s, developing their art practices but, by the siren call of “a $1 per page”, were subverted into writing erotic stories for a private collector. In the process they were also subverting pornography; the collector constantly complained, asking for “less poetry, more sex”, but he continued to purchase the stories.
Everyone was writing up their sexual experiences. Invented, overheard, researched from Krafft-Ebing and medical books. We had comical conversations. We told a story and the rest of us had to decide true or false. Or plausible. Was this plausible? Robert Duncan would offer to experiment, to test our inventions, to confirm or negate our fantasies. All of us needed the money, so we pooled our stories.
The Journals of Anais Nin Volume III 1974 Quartet

Associated with Nin, are the photographic surreal collages of Val Telberg, an artist born in Moscow in 1910 to Finnish parents and brought up in China. He moved to New York in 1938 and was introduced to surrealism while working as a photographer, thus sparking his interest in photomontage.
My edition of House of Incest by Anaïs Nin, the 1958 edition, is the first edition where Nin had requested Telberg to incorporate surrealistic photomontages. This collaboration became well-known, as all subsequent editions of the book contain his work, including Nin’s own image within the photomontages.

F82 Roast Lamb for dinner 2018 archival ink jet on cotton rag
Killing
As a boy killing animals for food was a part of life, I can remember being taken to the local abattoir and watching a calf being killed. I am not sure whether this was on a school excursion or, as my sister worked in the local Butcher Shop, it was just a casual visit. Either way, while I felt sorry for the calf, the killing did not particularly affect, possibly because it was one of my jobs to kill any non-laying chicken, for the table. Remove head with an axe, drain the blood, dip in a copper laundry tub of hot water and feathers removed, then gut. The latter was fascinating, saving the heart, gizzard, liver and searching for un-formed eggs, just yolks, if there were a number we had made a mistake re non-laying, but they were collected anyway and used in cakes. The offal was cooked, the heart and gizzard were fought over by my brother and I, being older he usually won and had which ever he fancied on the day.​