Actually there were only 4 who bought it originally in the 1950’s Steve from the Comte. Rousseau(2.2ha), Fourrier(1 ha), Esmonin (1.6ha) and the Clair-Dau family(2ha).
Later the Clair-Dau segment was split 1ha each by Jadot and Bruno Clair. I have been in the parking lot of the house which I assume must have belonged to the Comte.
The front of the home faces the vineyard across a wall. (The owner of the home now is a friend of Monsieur Gagey.) It is a wonderful place to see the vineyard. A truly wonderful plot of land.
The reason I heard (I think from Brooklynguy’s interview of Jean-Marie Fourrier) for why all the CSJ parcels run the whole length from top-to-bottom is that parcels were typically sold by the ouvrees, and it just so happened that each row of CSJ is almost exactly one ouvre (ouvree?), so they just sold them by the row. I’ve never before heard that it had anything to do with collusion amongst the purchasers.
You both know much more than I do, I was just passing along Morris’ thoughts. Thanks for the addtional info Don as I was under the impression the parcels not only ran from top to bottom, but were also of equal size, which is not so.
This actually was pulled from the wiki which is pretty accurate I think. That is pretty amazing to tell you the truth. Their information is a distillation of Clive’s two books and Jasper’s new book. I knew that Clair-Dau had a huge part of the original split with Esmonin(who bought the 1.6ha that had been in metayage with the Comte for some time) and Rousseau. Fourrier got 1ha which was the smallest parcel. Anyway, I don’t think there was any collusion here. More of a grand bargain. The parcels were all different sizes.
The row length in Clos St Jacques is pretty uniform however. It does run top to bottom. They have little bows and markers on some of the vines. Not sure all of the rows owned by different folks are contiguous too. That is information that you might find difficult to obtain.
Though I read the same think in Morris, I am a little skeptical of some of the apocryphal stuff floating around in Burgundy lore…particularly as to the vineyards that didn’t get knighted “grand cru” in the original AOC in the thirties. They usually evolve around famous personalities…like d’Angerville or Gouges or Moucheron. At least in the case of the first two…and others…I sort of can’t believe that grand cru status was thwarted by the noblesse of a few owners…at the expense of many others…if the vineyards were really otherwise heading for grand cru ranking. It, again, reminds me of the need to keep the issue of winemakers/producers and vineyard sites as separate concepts…which is what I think the AOC tries its best to do, valuing the historical esteem more than the exitsting status of the particular vineyards. (Which is why I think Cros Parantoux will never make it…because of the chicken and egg issues and its history.)
to Gregg Greenbaum, you wrote: “With all this talk of upgrading to GC, has there been any discussion of “cleaning up” existing GCs like Vougeot?”
If you are waiting for the French government to downgrade any existing Grand Cru Burgundy vineyards, you will need patience. I don’t think we’re talking centuries, we’re probably talking millenia, when Grand Cru Pinot Noir will be grown in northern Denmark and Malmo, and Syrah, Grenache and especially Carignan will be the preferred and authorized varietals in Gevrey and Vosne. Champagne will be an English Appellation, although the Scots will be making claims.
to all:
If I was going to promote a single Cote de Beaune vineyard to Grand Cru status, I would agree with Rugiens, but if that happened, I would find it hard to exclude Epenots and even harder to exclude Volnay Caillerets, Clos des Ducs and maybe parts of Clos des Chenes. Not to mention Beaune Clos des Ursules.
Claude, it is much more fair to say that Rodier nearly copied Lavalle’s classification, he sure copied text in descriptions. And, R Danguy et Ch Aubertin should be placed within this group as well, before Rodier especially as this his writing was over 20 years after the Danguy/Aubertin book. Some credit should also be given to Jullien for what he did with classifications as well.
To the monks v Lavalle v INAO v expansions, I agree that there is something that has been lost after Lavalle. The expansion of Clos de la Roche, Clos St Denis and a few others are just examples of solid vineyards with their names/identities being swept under the rug. Examples include Calouère and Maison Brûlée in Morey Saint Denis.
Re the Clos Vougeot, one hears ad nauseam that the lower and middle parts are only grand cru by historical accident. In my view this is quite wrong and there are plenty of magnificent wines made even exclusively from the lower part. The fact that some are substandard is in no way a reflection of the potential of the land, as with other GCs
Ray – I only mentioned Rodier and Lavalle as examples, and I chose them simply because Jasper Morris gives their rankings (along with his) for each vineyard. BTW, Jasper makes comparing their evaluations quite easy, and despite what you say about Rodier’s copying Lavalle’s classification, I’ve noticed some significant (and surprising) differences.
Howard…I doubt the owners would do much pushing as they do not really need to.
For me they are g-crus except in names only.
In Quebec, Canada all the Amoureuses are selling more than most the 2nd tiers G-cru. For the 5 land-owners in CSJ : (1) Rousseau CSJ is one of his big-3 and he just prices it slightly below his 2 top C-crus Chambertin & Chambertin-CdBeze; (2) The price for CSJ by Fourrier, Jadot and to a certain extend B.Clair have been on the rise for the last few years; and (3) Esmonin is now the only affordable CSJ.
Please remember…I believe …tax will be higher if your AOC is up-grade to g-crus status .
I beg to differ. I very rarely buy and only rarely drink Burgundy at the rarified level of these wines, but based on my experiences of the Cote Chalonnaise and Cote de Beaune, I fine 2008 a well below average vintage.
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