Chablis Wine - History

History

It is likely that vines came to the region with the Romans, if not before. As elsewhere, the Dark Ages saw monasteries putting great effort into viticulture for communion wine, and the proximity of Auxerre meant that the market in Paris was readily accessible. There are records in the mid-15th century of Chablis wine being shipped to England, Flanders and Picardy. But in February 1568 the town was razed by the Huguenots, and the region did not really recover until the 18th century. Then came the ravages of the French Revolution, the Little Ice Age and Prussian invasions. Just as the vineyards were being built back up, they were hit first by oidium in the 1880s, and then by the phylloxera epidemic. Following two World Wars, the Chablis wine industry wouldn't recover till the second half of the 20th century.

As was the case with many of France's oldest wine regions, the Romans were likely the first to introduce viticulture to the Chablis region. These early plantings were used to sustain the Roman garrisons but they soon became a holding of the local peasantry who made wine for daily and family use. During the Middle Ages the Catholic Church, particularly the Cistercian monks, became a major influence in establishing the economic and commercial interest of viticulture for the region. Chardonnay was believed to be first planted in Chablis by the Cistercians at Pontigny Abbey in the 12th century and from there spread south to the rest of the Burgundy region. The region became part of Burgundy in the 15th century when it was annexed by the Dukes of Burgundy. The easy accessible Seine river, via the nearby Yonne river, gave the Chablis wine producers a near monopoly with lucrative Parisian market. In the 17th century, the English discovered the wine and began importing large volumes. By the 19th century there were nearly 98,840 acres (40,000 ha) of vines planted in Chablis with vineyards stretching from the town of Chablis to Joigny and Sens along the Yonne. Chablis wines were seen across northern France with even some Champagne producers using Chablis as part of a base wine for their sparkling cuvee.

The end of the 19th century saw of a period of calamity for the region beginning first with the opening of the development of railway systems that linked all parts of the country with Paris in the 1850s. This brought an influx of available inexpensive wine from regions in the Midi (such as the Languedoc) that undercut Chablis' presence in the Parisian market. The 1880s saw the dual devastation of powdery mildew and phylloxera which ravaged vineyards. Many Chablis producers gave up winemaking, the acreage in the region steadily declining throughout much of the early 20th century. By the 1950s there were only 1,235 acres (500 ha) of vines planted in Chablis.

The 20th century did bring about a renewed commitment to quality production and ushered in technological advances that would allow viticulture to be more profitable and reliable in this cool northern climate. In 1938, the Institut National des Appellations d'Origine created the Appellation d'origine contrôlée (AOC) region for Chablis that mandated the grape variety (Chardonnay) and acceptable winemaking and viticultural practices within delineated boundaries. One of the objectives of the AOC establishment was to protect the name "Chablis", which by this time was already being inappropriately used to refer to just about any white wine made from any number of white grape varieties all across the world. In the early 1960s, technological advances in vineyard frost protection minimized some of the risk and financial cost associated with variable vintages and climate of Chablis. The worldwide "Chardonnay-boom" of the mid-late 20th century, opened up prosperous worldwide markets to Chablis and vineyard plantings saw a period of steady increase. By 2004, vineyard plantings in Chablis reached a little over 10,000 acres (4,000 ha).