Le champagne et sa région | Historique | Les Débuts

The champagne and its region | History | Introduction

Making its appearance during the 18th century, Champagne was a new product, but it was already the result of long experience that had associated the vine producers' determination with the wine merchants' inventiveness.

In fact, several centuries had gone by before the production techniques and the handling of champagne were perfected.

The history of champagne recalls how, in a region that was often among the first to witness the sufferings of its country, wine production became, slowly at first and later more markedly, directed towards the production of this unique wine with its specific character, which we know today as champagne.

Origins

A legend tells that the wild vines on the banks of the Marne River were said to have been blessed by Cupid's blood, giving birth to the Champagne vineyard.

Even though the fossilized vine leaves found at Sézanne have been dated from the Tertiary Period, they do not correspond to "vitis vinifera", the species to which the vine types that are today grown in the Champagne region belong. This species certainly began to spread around the 1st century AD, from the oldest Burgundy and Moselle vineyards.

In his will (the date of which is debated), St. Rémi, the Bishop of Reims, who died in 533 AD, left several plots of vines to the Church of Reims.
This episode proves that the clergy and the religious orders contributed in real terms to the development of the Champagne vineyard, particularly during the 7th century, a period in which numerous abbeys came into being. The monks lived there, praying and working the land.

After then in Champagne, the forest was cleared to make way for the vines to occupy these new lands that were needed for wine production.

First Champagne

In the 9th century, the bishops and noblemen owned the estates where vines were planted in Champagne, and because wine production was lucrative, they sought to enlarge them.
The monks, for example, consumed their wine at mass or simply as a drink. They offered it to their more or less prestigious visitors and, of course, they also sold it.
Thus the existence of ecclesiastical, monastic and aristocratic wines in the Champagne region led to the sale of "Champagne wines" from the 9th century onwards.

Shipment of wines originating from Champagne at that time took place via the river (to Paris and Rouen), and later, in the 12th century, by sea (to Flanders, Holland, England, Portugal and Spain) and by land, using the old Roman roads that went through Reims, and provided access to the famous Champagne Fairs.

The region thus benefited from a favourable situation. Chalons and Reims, the coronation city of the Kings of France, where the festivities allowed the province's wines to become well known, were the main two places for trading in wine, which was a luxury product between the 12th and 15th centuries, and was only accessible to the nobility and the clergy.

Middle age development

From the 10th to the 15th century, the Champagne vineyard grew steadily, but not continuously due to the invasions and wars the region continually suffered from.

At the beginning of the 12th century, there were about 130 villages that had vine-producing estates, whereas at the end of the 15th century there were close to 400, mainly around Reims, Vitry le François, Epernay and Vertus.

During this period, the development of the vineyard was also social. The vine producer, who between the 9th and 11th centuries was often a serf or a tenant in the service of the ecclesiastical or princely estates, gradually began to acquire property due to the breaking up of large estates by an indebted nobility.

In the 15th century, the vine producers' conditions were better, sometimes even comfortable, and it is to them that we owe the maintenance of the Champagne vineyard after these troubled times.