Chalosse Noire

William Franck, the Bordeaux wine merchant whose Traité sur les vins du Médoc first appeared in 1824, already listed “la petite Chalosse noire” among the vines planted for common wines, with very big oblong berries in very big bunches. His 1845 edition adds the use that set it apart: “It is the kind that keeps best for winter and is served at dessert” («C'est l'espèce qui se garde le mieux pour l'hiver et qu'on sert au dessert»), hung by the stalk on cords until March or April. Its wine, he wrote, was common and a little soft, but lasting and of a fine color.

Others were less kind. Armand d’Armailhacq, a Médoc proprietor, in his 1855 book on the vines and wines of the Médoc, found the bunch enormous and the yield abundant but the wine without color or sap. Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, wrote in 1868 that it has “a fairly pretty color, but neither sap, nor strength, nor finesse” («une assez jolie couleur , mais n'a ni sève , ni force , ni finesse»). The guide still named the “Petite-Chalosse noire” among minor vines in 1922.

DNA markers place Chalosse Noire (VIVC 22964) among the offspring of Gouais Blanc, with the second parent unknown (Boursiquot et al., 2004; Lacombe et al., 2013). The match with the books’ vine is likely, not settled: the 1893 guide gave “Chalosse-Noire” as a Bas-Médoc name of the Fer, and VIVC lists Chalosse Noire among the names of Béquignol Noir, Fer, and Jurançon Noir.

Oldest record in my library: William Franck, Traité sur les vins du Médoc, 1824