Bordeaux - History, Trade & Ownership Flashcards
Who created a complex series of drainage channels throughout the area, making the Médoc suitable for viticulture in the mid-1600s?
The Dutch
Which class of wealthy people established the great châteaux of the Médoc when the marshes became habitable?
The “noblesse de la robe” (Nobles/Nobility of the Robe), in 17th- and 18th-century France, a class of hereditary nobles who acquired their rank through holding a high state office.
Which nation ruled Bordeaux from 1152 to 1453 and what style of wine were they thirsty for?
England. The English had a pre-existing thirst for claret.
What about Bordeaux’s geographical position contributed to its success as a center of trade?
Its proximity to the Atlantic.
Bordeaux’s ancient name prior to it falling under King Clovis’ Frankish control?
Burdigala
Who pled to annul her mariage to to King Louis VII and then married Henry II, the Duke of Normandy and future King of England, to become Queen of England when Henry ascended to the throne in 1154, thus transferring the title of the Duchy of Aquitaine to the English House of Plantagenet?
Eleanor of Aquitaine
The English monarch ruled Aquitaine (including Bordeaux) from 1154 to 1453. What ended the English’s ruling over the region?
The Hundred Years’ War concluded at the Battle of Castillon in 1453 with the Plantagenet dynasty (English) finally lost and conceded Aquitaine to the Valois (the French).
How did the Dutch supplant the English as Bordeaux’s most important direct customers after the French took over?
The Dutch had established Europe’s foremost commercial maritime fleet by the early 1600s and dominated commercial shipments of wine from the port of Bordeaux in the 17th century.
What styles of wine did the Dutch customers demand at the time, unlike the English who originally preferred the light red clairet of the region?
Sweet white wines and full-bodied, deeply coloured reds
How did the Dutch first manage to produce full-bodied reds to suit the palates of its customers?
The Dutch eagerly blended the darker wines of Cahors or Southern Europe with the lighter reds of Bordeaux to create sterner stuff more suited to palates of the north.
Dutch engineers built a system of canals to drain the marshy lowlands of the Médoc, reclaiming the gravelly, alluvial lands north of the city of Bordeaux. What is the French name used to refer to these individual canals?
Jalles
Which château became the first house to release wine as a single estate in the 1660s?
Haut-Brion
When does Malbec arrives in Bordeaux from Southwest France?
1730
The 1855 classification was drawn up in anticipation of which event?
The 1855 Universal Exposition in Paris
Which emperor called for the Bordeaux Chamber of Commerce to select the region’s best wines for presentation to the public for the 1855 Universal Exposition in Paris?
Emperor Napoleon III
What was the 1855 classification based on?
The courtiers quickly drew up a list of the top estates of Bordeaux and the ranking was based on price.
When was Château Mouton-Rothschild elevated from second growth to premier cru classé by the French minister of agriculture?
1973
When was the Cru Bourgeois classification first defined?
1932
When were the Graves first classified?
1953
When was Saint-Émilion first classified?
1955
Mythical/legendary vintage in Bordeaux that was initially met with suspicion by the Bordelaise but continually praised by Robert Parker?
1982
When was the Cru Artisan classification formally recognized?
2002
When did Château Latour famously bowed out of “en primeur” trading?
2012
In the second half of the 19th century, which 3 vineyard diseases of American origin arrived in succession in Bordeaux?
Oidium (powdery mildew)
Phylloxera
Peronospera (downy mildew)
Phylloxera in Bordeaux led to the propagation of which type of vines for smaller operations that could not afford to simply replant and graft?
Hybrid vines
Even in 2011, what hybrid vine was the fourth-most planted red grape in Bordeaux?
Villard Noir
