The first attempt of terroir zoning from geological map: Henri Coquand and the settlement of Cognac crus in the mid-19th century

Abstract

The business of Cognac brandy has always used “Crus” as quality brands. Georges de Salignac took the initiative of definition and cartography of the different “Crus” near 1850, way before settlement of the appellation.

On the one hand, as manager of the “Société des Propriétaires Vinicoles de Cognac”, Salignac mandated Eugène Lacroix to establish a “Crus” map for business purposes. It was decided to assign each village a grade, corresponding to the commercial rating of the wines or brandies produced locally. A preliminary map was available in 1854, complimented in 1861 and published in 1864. The map transcribes the hierarchy of places in the brandy business, the highest quality “Grande Champagne” being restricted to a limited area just South of Cognac. The quality deceases away from Cognac so that the “Crus” map draws concentric aureoles around the city.

On the other hand, Salignac, as general councilor of Cognac, was managing the geological mapping project of the department Charente given to Henri Coquand in 1848. Salignac asked Coquand to care of the land agronomic potential in the course of his geological studies and to investigate the question of relationship between the soil and brandy quality. Coquand came up in 1862 with the idea of geology as a primary trigger to quality. The geological formations he has been able to map are sufficient to predict the quality so that an optimal management of wine and brandy production should be conducted according to soil properties.

Coquand highlighted major incongruences between the Lacroix map and his own results. None of the “Crus” are constantly linked to a distinctive geology. “Grande Champagne” is largely restricted to the Campanian chalk but this formation extends broadly in other “Crus” areas. Coquand suggests that this situation is empirically understood by some Cognac merchants who take benefit to it by buying at low-price, high-quality brandy produced outside of the prestigious “Grande Champagne” area but from vines grown on similar geological substrate. Some local producers were able to upgrade their production value by transferring their wines or brandy to colleagues settled in “Champagne Cru” before it is sold to the main trading companies.

By the end of the 19^th century, the branding, historical concept of terroirs definitively took over the natural criteria in the mapping of the “Crus”. Nowadays, the work of Coquand is only invocated in post hoc justification “Cru” mapping of the Cognac appellation.

References

Coquand, H. (1862). Description physique, géologique, paléontologique et minéralogique du département de la Charente. Badatier-Feissat & Demonchy, Marseille, 2, 312 p.