France > Bordeaux

Bordeaux- history, wealth and power

Bordeaux was settled in the 6th-5th Century BC by celtic tribes, eventually acquiring the name Burgidalia by about 300 BC. The Romans built a legionary camp and eventually a town there, at the widest point of the river where their engineers could still bridge the river, adopting the Celtic name. The Romans planted the ancient variety Biturica, hardy enough to survive the harsher winters away from the Mediterranean. Biturica plantings were maintained, largely by the Church through the Roman and Medieval periods. The Roman city became an important entrepot for tin and lead shipped from Cornwall to Rome and a major trading town and port by the late First Century AD. After being sacked by the Vandals in 276 and again in 409, then by the Visigoths in 414 and the Franks in 498, the city with its grand amphitheatre and imperial monuments, fell into a period of obscurity.

The city became an important political and episcopal seat as the capital of the Frankish Duchy of Vasconia, established to keep control of the Basques to the south, with Vasconia derived from the Frankish pronunciation of Basque. Over time, the name transmuted from Vasconia to Gascony, the name in use today for the region from Bordeaux south to the Pyrennees.

In 732 the city was again sacked and plundered, this time by Umayyad forces under Abd er Rahman, but Duke Eudes of Acquitaine was able to repel the Moors and regain control through the battles of Bordeaux and Poitiers, which marked the high point of Arab incursion into western Europe. In 737 Charles Martel, the Major Domo of a series of weak Merovingian kings, defeated Eudes’ son, conquered Bordeaux and proclaimed himself Duke (of several territories) and Prince of the Franks. The Royal title itself lapsed after the death of the Merovingian King Theuderic IV and no King as named until Martel’s son Pepin assumed the royal title in 751, followed by his own son Charles the Great (Charlemagne) who was named Emperor in 800 AD, 324 years after the last Emperor in the West was deposed in 476.

Bordeaux continued as the capital of Acquitaine and Gascony and a bustling trade center in spite of repeated Viking invasions, and political stability was established under the house of Poitiers until the area fell under English control as a result of Henry II’s marriage to Eleanor of Acquitaine in 1152. This ushered in a three-century period of strong English influence over Bordeaux, which led directly to the English influence over the Bordeaux wine trade in the 16th and 17th Centuries. Bordeaux and Gascony were finally formally annexed to the Kingdom of France only in 1653 with the entry of Louis XIV and his army into the city.

In the 17th Century, the Dutch, along with the Hanseatic League and the Bretons, became major buyers of Bordeaux wine. They established trading houses in the city, buying the finest wines and shipping them in barrel back to the home countries. The Dutch introduced the technique of sterilizing the barrels with sulfur to protect the quality of the wine during shipment.

The 18th century saw another golden age of Bordeaux. Port de la Lune, The Port of the Moon, Bordeaux’ harbor district, supplied the majority of Europe with coffee, cocoa, sugar, cotton and indigo, becoming France's busiest port and the second busiest port in the world after London. The Dutch, engaging more deeply with the production of fine wines, brought in hydraulic engineers to drain the swamplands of the Medoc, creating one of the worlds most important fine wine regions. This is the period in which Cabernet Sauvignon appears to have evolved, as a natural cross between the longer-planted Cabernet Franc (originating in southern Gascony and later brought north to Saint Emilion, and Sauvignon Blanc (originating in the Loire and later brought south to Bordeaux).

By French Revolution (1789), The Gironde valley’s economic economy was driven by the city of Bordeaux’s trade and commerce; principally the colonial trade with the Caribbean colonies, the slave trade, and the wine trade with northern Europe. The trade in enslaved people was mostly in those headed to France’s colony of Sant-Domingue (currently Haiti). The slave revolt of 1791 in Haiti, “The Pearl of the West Indies” and France’s most profitable overseas colony, led to the colony’s independence from Napoleonic France in 1804, and led to the collapse of the slave trade and with it, the Bordeaux economy.

After the Bourbon Restoration under Louis XVIII in 1814, the economy of Bordeaux was rebuilt by traders and shipowners. They built the first bridge since the Romans over the Gironde, and shipping traffic grew through the new African colonies. The city was transformed under its longtime prefect, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, who widened streets, created broad avenues and plazas and had block after block of handsome stone-facade buildings constructed. Victor Hugo found the rebuilt city so beautiful he said: "Take Versailles, add Antwerp, and you have Bordeaux.” Haussmann later used Bordeaux's large-scale rebuilding as a model when he was asked by Emperor Napoleon III to transform the quasi-medieval Paris into a "modern" capital that would make France proud.

In 1870, at the beginning of the Franco-Prussian war against Prussia, the French government temporarily relocated to Bordeaux from Paris. That recurred during World War I and again briefly during World War II, when it became clear that Paris would fall into German hands. Once Bordeaux also fell under German occupation, Italian and then German submarine bases were established in the city’s port. The massive, reinforced concrete U-boat pens have proved impractical to demolish and are now partly used as a cultural center for exhibitions.

today, listed by unesco

In 2007, 40% of the city surface area, located around the Port of the Moon, was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed as "an inhabited historic city, an outstanding urban and architectural ensemble, created in the age of the Enlightenment, whose values continued up to the first half of the 20th century, with more protected buildings than any other French city except Paris.”

The modern city is a world capital of wine, home to some of the most important global brokers and distributors, as well as a center for research and development. Le Cite du Vin, created by the Foundation for Wine Culture & Civilizations, is a monument to 8,000 years of winemaking history, including the 2,000 years since the Romans introduced the vine to Bordeaux.

the bordeaux classification system

Bordeaux has 5 classification systems tht overlay the appellations controlees. While the AC system delineates terroir by quality and style of the wines produced there, the classification systems work within a given AC to indicate relative quality. The five levels are

The 1855 Classification (Medoc & Sauternes-Barsac)

The Saine Emilion Classification of 1955

The Graves Classificaiton of 1959

The Cru Bourgeois Classification (updated annually)

The Crus Artisans Classification of 1989, reviewed every 5 years.

The Chateaux of the Medoc were first classified for the Exposition Universelle de Paris in 1855. Of the 6,000 or so Chateaux in the Medoc region, a total of 61 crus classés (classified growths). These are divided into five categories: 5 Premiers Crus (First Growths), 14 Deuxièmes Crus (Second Growths), 14 Troisièmes Crus (Third Growths), 10 Quatrièmes Crus (Fourth Growths), and 18 Cinquièmes Crus (Fifth Growths). All but one of these châteaux are located in the Médoc region, with Château Haut-Brion in Graves too great to be left out, being the exception. A significant revision to the system in 1955 elevated Chateau Mouton from Deuxieme to Premier Grand Cru Classe status, creating today’s 5 Premiers Grands Crus out of some 6,000 estates.

Graves, classified in 1959, includes 16 Grands Crus Classes, which of course includes Chateau Haut-Brion making it a Premier Grand Cru of the Medoc and a Grand Cru Classe of Graves.

Sauternes-Barsac, with its 4700 acres, 140 growers and 126 chateaux was classified in 1855 along with the Medoc, dividing the crus into three levels. Premier Cru Superieur (one estate, Chateau d’Yquem), Premier Cru (11 Chateaux) and Deuxieme Cru (15 Chateaux). The AOC Barsac, adjacent to Sauternes, may use either the Sauternes or Barsac designation.

Saint-Emilion, was first classified in 1955, and that classification is revisited about every ten years, most recently in 2022. There are four levels in the St. Emilion classification of its wines, Premier Grand Cru Classe A (2 estates), Premier Grand Cru Classe B (17 estates), Grand Cru Classe (71 estates), and Grand Cru (about 400 estates). The distinction between Saint Emilion Grand Cru Classe and Saint Emilion Grand Cru is important- the Classe designation is a quality distinction regarding the vineyard (or portion of a Chateau’s vineyards), which Saint Emilion Grand Cru is an appellation controllee with exactly the same geographic range as Saint-Emilion. Compared to Saint-Emilion, Saint-Emilion Grand Cru requires lower yields and longer ageing before release, not unlike thee “Superiore” designation within the Italian DOC system. There has been some recent dispute over the way in which vineyards are assigned to the various classes, and as a result, both Chateau Cheval Blanc and Chateau Ausone, formerly Premier Grand Cru Classe A (and the only two until the 2012 reclassificaion), have pulled out of the system leaving just Chateau Angelus and then in 2021 Angelus dropped out, but in 2022 Chateau Figeac was promoted, leaving today Chateau Figeac and Chateau Pavie as Classe A estates.

Pomerol still has no official classification, but of the 150 or so estates in the tiny region’s 1976 acres, Chateau Petrus and Chateau Le Pin are widely regarded as being on a quality par with the first growth wines of the Medoc.

The Cru Bourgeois Classification- a voluntary classification scheme first formalized in 1932. Covers some 250 estates in the Medoc, Haut Medoc or any of the 6 villages in the Medoc with their own appellations controlees.

The Crus Artisans Classification- formalized in 1989, a group of 36 estates with Medoc or higher appellation, where the owner is actively involved in the vineyards and cellar. Recognized under EU regulation since 1994.

the bordeaux regions