As in the wine, what is the generally accepted meaning of the word "Merlot"?

It is generally accepted that the name of the "Merlot" grape, and by extension of the red wine bearing its name, is derived from a French word meaning "Little Blackbird" - the diminutive form of "Merle". In the local Occitan language this is spelt "Merlau".

The term was first recorded in 1784, when a reporter on the wines of Bordeaux spoke highly of it. There is some dispute as to whether it refers merely to the colour of the grape, or also to the habit of the relevant birds of eating the grapes from the vine. For a while there was an alternative name referring to the "seedling from the river"; the river in question being the Garonne.

The history of both the grape and the wine has not always been a smooth or happy one. In the 1950s and 1960s, grape harvests were lost to rot and to frost, and for a period in the 1970s, the planting of the Merlot grape was forbidden.

However, that is now in the past, and because of its smooth and full bodied taste (and, some cynics would contend, the fact that its name is fairly easy to pronounce!) Merlot is now one of the world's most popular wines; with the grape cultivated in other European countries as well as France and also in the New World.