Crosses
In the Middle Ages, the nobility and church of northeast France grew some form of Pinot in favoured plots, while peasants grew a large amount of the much more productive, but otherwise distinctly inferior, Gouais Blanc. Cross-pollination may have resulted from such close proximity, with the genetic distance between the two parents imparting hybrid vigour leading to the viticultural selection of a diverse range of offspring from this cross (which may, nevertheless, have also resulted from deliberate human intervention). In any case, however it occurred, offspring of the Pinot - Gouais cross include: Chardonnay, Aligoté, Auxerrois, Gamay, Melon and eleven others. It should not however be inferred that Pinot noir was the Pinot involved here; any member of the Pinot family appears genetically capable of being the Pinot parent to these ex-Gouais crosses.
In 1925 Pinot noir was crossed in South Africa with the Cinsaut grape (known locally by the misnomer 'Hermitage') to create a unique variety called Pinotage.
Read more about this topic: Pinot Noir
Famous quotes containing the word crosses:
“Life is like walking along a crowded street—there always seem to be fewer obstacles to getting along on the opposite pavement—and yet, if one crosses over, matters are rarely mended.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“When an American heiress wants to buy a man, she at once crosses the Atlantic. The only really materialistic people I have ever met have been Europeans.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)