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Must

Viniculture
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Must is the freshly pressed grape juice that includes skins, seeds, and stems, which begins fermentation to become wine.

Detailed Definition
Must’s poetic appeal is its raw, unfermented state—it is potentiality, the chaotic infant of wine, full of sugar and wild yeast. Poets use must to symbolize beginnings, the primal matter before art, or the fermenting emotions of early love. Its cloudy, murky appearance contrasts with the clarity of finished wine, offering a metaphor for the process of refinement. Must also evokes the biblical “new wine” and ancient rituals, linking it to themes of sacrifice, transformation, and the untamed forces of nature.
Example
Example in poetry:
Must|"Must is the freshly pressed grape juice, a liquid of potential, the raw material of wine, a poem in its first draft."; "The poet sees in must the beginning of transformation, the moment before fermentation, full of possibility."; "Must is a cloudy, sweet liquid, a subject for poems about the chaos before creation."; "The poet uses must to discuss the early stages of art, the unformed, unrefined material that will become something greater."; "Must is the grape's first gift, a taste of the harvest before it is shaped by the winemaker's art."; "The poet compares must to a poet's first ideas, raw and unstructured, but full of potential."
Additional Notes
Must is the freshly pressed grape juice that includes the skins, seeds, and stems, before it begins fermentation. This raw, unfermented liquid is a symbol of potential, the primal material from which wine will be made. For poets, must can represent the beginning of a creative process, the raw, unstructured ideas that will eventually be shaped into a finished work. Its cloudy, unstable nature suggests chaos and possibility, a state of becoming that is both exciting and precarious. Students should consider that the quality of the must directly affects the final wine, making it a subject for poems about the importance of foundations and origins. Related terms include fermentation, pressing, and pomace.
Also Known As
grape juice fresh ferment unfermented nectar
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