History of the vineyard in Touraine | James Derouet

The department of Indre-et-Loire shapes a vine leaf. With this form, the Garden of France has been able to boast for centuries about its vines as much as its roses, its vineyards as much as its castles, its renowned wines as much as its illustrious writers and poets. Most of them have indeed paid tribute to the red and white wines, the still and sparkling wines of our Touraine. The history of winemaking in Touraine unfolds along its vineyards, around the wines and the winemakers, from 1830 to 1930. A period of profound changes. Winemakers stop using the "marre," a kind of pick with which they sometimes made noise to announce the end of work, and abandon the plow for the tractor. In 1882, phylloxera appears in Noizay at Mrs. Baratin's - in 1883, a classification of the vineyard is carried out, similar to the one from Bordeaux in 1855, on the 65,000 hectares that our department counted. In this selection, among the 173 retained municipalities, the wines of Saint-Avertin are classified as premier cru and those of Montlouis as second cru. It is true that the "Tête de Saint-Avertin" could be aged for 15 to 20 years and had a national reputation. Winemaking flourished thanks to great personalities: Chaptal, the Mabille brothers and their press. Also thanks to known or unknown winemakers. You may discover among the thousand names mentioned, an ancestor who was a winemaker, cooper, distiller. The hills cradle vines with appealing names: Groslot from Cinq-Mars, Martineau Gloire de Touraine, or Côt précoce de Tours. To be enjoyed without moderation, whether you are a novice or an ampelographer, a wine lover or an oenologist, a tourist or a descendant of a Tourangeau, owner of a modest vine or a producer harvesting several hectares.