Bourgogne de Histoire

[jgould]

i'm curious as to why bordeaux's great estates were not broken up vis-a-vis bourgogne's, as per the code napoléon of 1804, which imposed new inheritance rules requiring property to be equally split among offspring upon the death of the owner. the reason why today there are so many tiny vineyards in burgundy. it would appear bordeaux's great estates would have also been subdivided as well, but they are not.

Edited November 25, 2004 by jgould (log)

[jgould]

no historians here????

[Busboy]

no historians here???? 

←

My understanding is that, first, many of the vinyards had been given over to the church, through the benificense of wealthy landowners trying to ensure an eternity in Heaven, so they were a ripe target for the revolutionaries who were virulently anti-cleric. And, second, Burgundy was both much closer to Paris and more politically active/threatening than Bordeaux - the Dukes of Burgundy having historically been very powerful and loathe to submit to Paris -- so the revolutionary government was more eager to ingratiate themselves to the locals and to attack the entrenched aristocracy; liberating the vinyards allowed them to do both.

[jgould]

no historians here???? 

←

My understanding is that, first, many of the vinyards had been given over to the church, through the benificense of wealthy landowners trying to ensure an eternity in Heaven, so they were a ripe target for the revolutionaries who were virulently anti-cleric. And, second, Burgundy was both much closer to Paris and more politically active/threatening than Bordeaux - the Dukes of Burgundy having historically been very powerful and loathe to submit to Paris -- so the revolutionary government was more eager to ingratiate themselves to the locals and to attack the entrenched aristocracy; liberating the vinyards allowed them to do both.

←

thanks, however, it was due to the code napoleon (1804), not the french revolution of 1789, that broke up the great land estates/vineyards of burgundy by enforcing the code, which required the estate to be split among all heirs, thereby breaking up these large holdings into many smaller ones. hence, the small little vineyards in burgundy vs. the large vineyards in bordeax. prior to the code, the estate usually passed, in full, to the designated heir.

my question/inquiry is why weren't the large land estates/vineyards also broken up & subdivided among ALL the heirs in bordeaux??

[Rebel Rose]

Hmm. History was always my worst subject. (My feeling was always, let's just not go there again. . . )

But I think I remember reading somewhere that the inheritance laws were only enforced for commoners, and that certain levels of nobility were able to escape it through bribery or favoritism . . .

[Busboy]

no historians here???? 

←

My understanding is that, first, many of the vinyards had been given over to the church, through the benificense of wealthy landowners trying to ensure an eternity in Heaven, so they were a ripe target for the revolutionaries who were virulently anti-cleric. And, second, Burgundy was both much closer to Paris and more politically active/threatening than Bordeaux - the Dukes of Burgundy having historically been very powerful and loathe to submit to Paris -- so the revolutionary government was more eager to ingratiate themselves to the locals and to attack the entrenched aristocracy; liberating the vinyards allowed them to do both.

←

thanks, however, it was due to the code napoleon (1804), not the french revolution of 1789, that broke up the great land estates/vineyards of burgundy by enforcing the code, which required the estate to be split among all heirs, thereby breaking up these large holdings into many smaller ones. hence, the small little vineyards in burgundy vs. the large vineyards in bordeax. prior to the code, the estate usually passed, in full, to the designated heir.

my question/inquiry is why weren't the large land estates/vineyards also broken up & subdivided among ALL the heirs in bordeaux??

←

I think you are incorrect. I believe that the reason Burgundy vinyards are so maddeningly subdvided has nothing to do with splitting the vines up amongst various heirs of individual owners I believe it was seized by the state and given over to the peasants. The 80-plus owners of Clos Vougeot are not the many descendants of one owner, they are the descendants of the original 80 peasants who got a row or so of vines back in the 1790s.

However, now my inner wonk is awakened, and I will try to hunt down somebody with credentials who can support mye, and look forward to hearing similarly authoritative word from you.

[jgould]

jgould:

thanks, however, it was due to the code napoleon (1804), not the french revolution of 1789, that broke up the great land estates/vineyards of burgundy by enforcing the code, which required the estate to be split among all heirs, thereby breaking up these large holdings into many smaller ones. hence, the small little vineyards in burgundy vs. the large vineyards in bordeax. prior to the code, the estate usually passed, in full, to the designated heir.

my question/inquiry is why weren't the large land estates/vineyards also broken up & subdivided among ALL the heirs in bordeaux??

busboy:

I think you are incorrect. I believe that the reason Burgundy vinyards are so maddeningly subdvided has nothing to do with splitting the vines up amongst various heirs of individual owners I believe it was seized by the state and given over to the peasants. The 80-plus owners of Clos Vougeot are not the many descendants of one owner, they are the descendants of the original 80 peasants who got a row or so of vines back in the 1790s.

However, now my inner wonk is awakened, and I will try to hunt down somebody with credentials who can support my, and look forward to hearing similarly authoritative word from you.

jgould:

ummm... that make sense; however, it does "appear" that the split up stems from the napoleonic code of 1804 (?). i may be incorrect, that's why i'm asking. if the above is was true, then bordeaux would have also been split similiarly, n'est-ce pas????

will try to do the same, but so far i have been unsuccessful. cannot find a site or book that refers to this question directly.

Edited November 26, 2004 by jgould (log)

[jgould]

in Bordeaux, the Revolution of 1789, blew away the old proprietors, & the "State" confiscated & accounted for changes in ownership. the Church was not a major owner of vineyards.

in Burgundy, the Revoution dispossessed the church's enormous holdings with new money replacing until the "Code" increased the fragmentation by requiring, upon a parent's death, to divide the land equally among all the sons. with each new generation, more fragmentation.

ex. the vineyards of Clos Vougeot (noted above) are only 50 hectares, but have 77+ landowners, apparently related thru the generational owners.

so, it seems, that because the vineyards of Bordeaux were NOT principally owned by the Church, it was able to escape the fragmentation that Burgundy was subjected to. whew!! if anyone has anything to add, please do.

[Really Nice!]

i'm curious as to why bordeaux's great estates were not broken up vis-a-vis bourgogne's, as per the code napoléon of 1804, which imposed new inheritance rules requiring property to be equally split among offspring upon the death of the owner. the reason why today there are so many tiny vineyards in burgundy. it would appear bordeaux's great estates would have also been subdivided as well, but they are not.

←

Short answer: Bordeaux had too much influence from the English.

Napoleonic code dictates that each child has the right to inherit equally.

Properly, the term applies to the entire body of French law, as contained in five codes dealing with civil, commercial, and criminal law, promulgated between 1804 and 1811. An initial draft completed in 1793, following the outbreak of the French Revolution, was a protest against the extreme diversity in the laws then in force in different parts of France. This draft was rejected by the National Convention, but finally the task of preparing another draft was entrusted in July 1800 to a commission consisting of the most eminent jurists of France. The new draft, with some conservative features, was completed in four months. It encountered considerable opposition before it was finally enacted. It was named in honor of Napoleon, emperor of France, who had participated in the formulation.

Prior to the Revolution, French nobility and the Catholic Church were the major vineyard owners in Burgundy, but after the Revolution, vineyards were distributed among the populace. (Bordeaux once owned by the English was considered somehow less French, and was not really that affected by the Revolution.) France's Napoleonic Code, which requires all land to be equally divided among one's heirs, further fragmented each family's small vineyard holdings.

The code follows the institutes of the Roman Corpus Juris Civilis in dividing civil law into personal status (e.g., marriage), property (e.g., easements), and the acquisition of property (e.g., wills), and it may be regarded as the first modern analogue to the Roman work. Not only was it applied by Napoleon to the territories under his control—N Italy, the Low Countries, and some of the German states—but it exerted a strong influence on Spain (and ultimately on the Latin American countries) and on all European countries except England.

See also 1855: A History of the Bordeaux Classification

[DonRocks]

I wrote Allen Meadows, aka BurgHound, and he gave me permission to quote him in his answer to this question.

Please take time to visit Allen's website at www.burghound.com - he publishes a bimonthly newsletter, and is generally recognized as the leading Burgundy expert in the United States, if not the entire world.

Cheers,

Rocks.

Allen's response:

--------------------------------------------------

Hi Don,

Sure, you're welcome to quote me, no prob. As to the question, it's frankly complicated, having as much to do with the size of the exploitations as it does with money and psychology. To make this brief though, most of the major châteaux in Bordeaux were sizeable operations and owned by wealthy, mostly absentee owners. Thus, when it came time to divide an estate among the heirs, most of these families (who were wealthy and well advised) elected to create the rough equivalent of a corporation (société anonyme). This resulted in the heirs becoming in essence shareholders in Château X with a profession resident manager retained to oversee their interests, make the wine, etc.

This became accepted practice and thus, it was no mark of shame for the heirs to retain ownership of one, or several châteaux in this fashion. And of course some heirs elected to subsequently re-acquire the shares belonging to their relatives and in doing so, some châteaux were "put back together" under a single owner as it were. Because most of the shareholders were truly absentee, it also explains why the big brokers rose to power in Bordeaux but not in say Burgundy; Burgundy though had a separate form of these brokers but there they were and are called négociants.

Corporate ownership is certain benefits, like allowing a famous château to remain essentially unchanged for centuries though it can have its problems as well; witness the recent control difficulties of Château d'Yquem as there was essentially a shareholder revolt (there was of course more to it but at it's essence, the heirs got tired of not realizing a market rate of return).

As your question points out, Burgundy is different for a variety of reasons and even to this day, relatively few sociétés anonyme exist; a few examples include the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, Domaine Leflaive and Domaine Comtes Lafon though there are of course others.

Anyway, the above is pretty simplistic but it is the main thrust of why things are the way they are today.

Best regards,

Allen Meadows,

Pubisher,

www.BurgHound.com

[jgould]

merci beaucoup

[ctgm]

Yquem was quite interesting. The family member who thought that he was in control returne from holiday to find that it had been sold in his absence. I think that there was some sort of court case to resolve it.

[jgould]

Yquem was quite interesting. The family member who thought that he was in control returne from holiday to find that it had been sold in his absence. I think that there was some sort of court case to resolve it.

←

actually, "if" i remember correctly the chateau was bought by either LVMH for their prestige wine & spirits division, or its principal, bernard arnault personally; by buying up enough shares to challenge the family in a contested proxy fight.

[jgould]

thanks to all the excellent replies. much appreciated in clearing up the Bx - vs. - Burgundy land issue.

[JPW]

Just finished a quite good book on Bordeaux called "Noble Rot". Can't recall the author's name off-hand, but I believe he is European editor for the Wall Street Journal (?).

The centerpiece of the book was about the Yquem ownership struggle.

Very interesting.