Ovid Napa Valley was founded in St. Helena in 2000 by Mark Nelson and Dana Johnson. The husband-and-wife team started a software company in the 1980s and sold it a decade later, allowing them to pursue their shared interest in wine. They acquired 15 acres on Pritchard Hill and named the winery after the Roman poet Ovid, author of Metamorphoses, which tells the stories of classical Greek and Roman mythology. Ovid had also been the name of the couple’s software company. Nelson and Johnson hired some of Napa Valley’s most esteemed winemaking and viticultural consultants, including David Abreu and Andy Erickson. Today the winemaker is Austin Peterson. Raised in Santa Rosa in a winemaking family, Peterson helped pay for his degree in enology at UC Davis by making and selling his own wines. He worked in winemaking in California, France, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina before joining Ovid in 2006. Ovid’s signature wine is a Bordeaux blend, and the winery produces only about 500 cases a year.