What wine descriptors really mean A comparison between dictionary definitions and real use

ABSTRACT The language of tasting notes is not always precise, since it is used to express sensations that can be very subjective. Wine tasters use descriptors to express what they see, smell and taste in a wine, but these common terms are often used even by wine experts with what has been termed as a blithe lack of precision. Hence, wine blogs and wine magazines often include wine glossaries that cover, among other wine vocabulary, wine tasting descriptors. These dictionaries and glossaries often result in problems of term selection and term definition. The purpose of this paper is to compare the specialised glossary or dictionary definitions of a limited number of descriptors with their actual use in wine tasting notes and come up with definitions which are a closer match to the descriptors as they are really used.