help identifying port bottle

[Patrick C.]

New to the port world and loving it. It was sharing a Tawny port with a friend that finally got me into the port world.

Received a bottle of port many years ago from a friend who owned a Bistro. I stashed it in the back of my closet thinking I would give it to someone later. Well 25 years later, I found it tucked away and decided to look at it further.

I am having trouble finding information on this Bottle and was hoping someone could help me out. Here are the particulars.
Label says:
Da Silva Porto
Port of the 1963 vintage
Produced bottled and shipped by C DA Silva, S.A.R.L Porto
Imported by Joseph George Distributing

Question:
What type of port is it?
Is it worth drinking or handing off to someone who will really appreciate it? (Considering I am new to port and probably wont appreciate it as much as a vintage drinker)
Thanks!

[Glenn E.]

Hi Patrick,

That should be a Vintage Port. C. da Silva is most commonly known for their Ports under the Dalva brand these days, but they've released Ports under several names over the years.

1963 was a very good year for Vintage Port, but C. da Silva is not really known as a top-tier producer. I would expect the Port to be fine - Port only very rarely "goes bad" in any significant way - but I doubt it will blow your socks off. The bottle itself is unique enough to make it an interesting contribution to a Port tasting, so if you have any in your area that's what I would recommend you do with it. Use it as your contribution to a larger tasting where you can share it with others, and also taste and experience the Ports that they bring.

Wine-searcher.com says that a 1963 Dalva is worth about $250. I would guess that is primarily due to its age and scarcity, not due to its quality.

Others here may be able to give you more information.

I have also sent you a private message - please respond to that ASAP.

[Andy Velebil]

I’d agree it appears to be a vintage port. Fill level isn’t so good though, so don’t expect anything near $250 for it if you’re thinking of selling it. I’d suggest Open it to enjoy with friends. It probably is going to have sediment so stand up the night before and carefully decant into something else until you reach the sediment.

[Patrick C.]

Thanks for the information. Port tasting would be a great opportunity, but I can seem to find any in my area.

Will keep looking. I now have 3 neighbors hooked on port. If I can get more, we may just have our own.

Hi Patrick,

That should be a Vintage Port. C. da Silva is most commonly known for their Ports under the Dalva brand these days, but they've released Ports under several names over the years.

1963 was a very good year for Vintage Port, but C. da Silva is not really known as a top-tier producer. I would expect the Port to be fine - Port only very rarely "goes bad" in any significant way - but I doubt it will blow your socks off. The bottle itself is unique enough to make it an interesting contribution to a Port tasting, so if you have any in your area that's what I would recommend you do with it. Use it as your contribution to a larger tasting where you can share it with others, and also taste and experience the Ports that they bring.

Wine-searcher.com says that a 1963 Dalva is worth about $250. I would guess that is primarily due to its age and scarcity, not due to its quality.

Others here may be able to give you more information.

I have also sent you a private message - please respond to that ASAP.

[Roy Hersh]

Port of the ____ Vintage, has always been used by companies that are presenting a wood-aged single harvest Port. I have OLD bottles of C. da Silva Vintage Port, (1905) etc. and the label is very different back then. That said, I am surprised both my colleagues thought this to be Vintage Port. In fact, I must ask them, why?

[Glenn E.]

First, the color looks more like a Ruby Port to me than an old Tawny Port. For a Tawny Port to be that dark it would have to have been in wood for many, many years, and that's clearly not the case here because the bottle itself (and Selo) looks quite old. In fact to me the bottle looks even older than 1963, but I'm no expert on bottles! Granted, color in pictures can be deceiving, but this looks like a Ruby Port to me.

Second, I don't recall having seen the phrase "Port of the XXXX Vintage" on anything as young as a 1963. When I've seen that phrase, it has been on much older bottles. By 1963 it seems that the more common phrase was "Reserve" or "Grand Reserve" to indicate a Colheita. (I have several from the mid-60s labeled as such.) For this to be a Tawny Port it wouldn't have been bottled until at least 1970, and probably later than that. That really seems off for the use of "Port of the XXXX Vintage" on the label. At least to me.

I also looked for a bottling date and didn't see one. The lack of a bottling date is pretty inconclusive... I was hoping that one would be there which would have made it easy to tell whether it was a ruby or a tawny.

Those were my reasons, at least. That said, the bottle shape does look like something that would have more likely been used for a tawny than for a ruby, so I wasn't 100% confident with my guess. And the color could be correct for a quasi-LBV or very young tawny, but 1963 is too early to be an LBV (because Taylor didn't "invent" the category until 1965 ) and bottling single-vintage tawnies that young wasn't all that common back then.

Either way I think my subsequent advice is still valid. It should still be a fine Port, but it's not likely to blow anyone away.

[Eric Menchen]

Port of the ____ Vintage, has always been used by companies that are presenting a wood-aged single harvest Port. I have OLD bottles of C. da Silva Vintage Port, (1905) etc. and the label is very different back then. That said, I am surprised both my colleagues thought this to be Vintage Port. In fact, I must ask them, why?

I recall seeing "Port of the ____ Vintage" on some bottles that did include a bottling date, and that date was consistent with Vintage Port.

[Andy Velebil]

Da Silva used that Selo until about 1973. I know as I have a very old tawny from them in a similar funky bottle with the old Selo that has a bottling date. So at best, this was 10 years past harvest. Yes, that would make it a tawny if they bottled it on or after 1970. However...

Da Silva always puts "Matured in Wood" and then a bottling date on the front label from tawny's of this era. Perhaps one of the early producers who did so very prominently on their front labels. This does not have it.

Da Silva also used "House Reserve" on their front labels of tawny's of this era. This doesn't have it.

Port of the ____ Vintage, has always been used by companies that are presenting a wood-aged single harvest Port.

This is not correct, as others have said. I too have seen it used on Ruby Ports as well.

Bottle is a toss up. There was so much bottled in different glass because, at times, it was hard to get bottles in Portugal. So there's nothing to say they didn't bottle some, or all, in what they had on hand or could get.

One odd thing is this has a foil capsule, like what is used for Champagne. Da Silva usually waxed these odd shaped bottles. It seems like this was cobbled together from what they had on hand or could quickly get.

I've never seen Da Silva use a black label with stars like this for any of their tawny's (or any other Ports of theirs). Usually they're a brown or redish-brown color for tawny's. One can make an assumption the use of the redish-brown/brown was to indicate tawny. This uses black, which perhaps indicates it's not a tawny (or the importer here wanted a very special label of his own. Who knows, back then there was a lot of oddities and not a lot of consistency).

While it could be tawny, more things point to it being a Ruby of some sort.

[Glenn E.]

I've never seen Da Silva use a black label with stars like this for any of their tawny's (or any other Ports of theirs).

I stumbled upon this picture today and then remembered this thread! The tiny gold lettering on this bottle says "Bottled in 1972" in case you're curious and can't enlarge it enough to read it.

2021-01-03 17.11.32.jpg (100.45 KiB) Viewed 2483 times

[Andy Velebil]

Glenn
Even that Dalva has a bottling date on the front. I think that’s the one thing that Da Silva always did and this bottle doesn’t have it from what I can see.

One thing I forgot to mention is the Selo and label could have been applied later. So while it MAY help, it may not either.

[Glenn E.]

Right, I posted the picture because it's a tawny with the black label and stars that you said you'd never seen.