Britain's Special Role

Britain's Special Role

Britain, which has never been а major wine pro­ducer, has nevertheless played а significant role in the development of European winemaking. In this respect, too, Britain followed the phi1osophy that has invariably guided its foreign policy: through encouraging competition for the British market among individual producers and regions, it helped set and improve standards. Some of today's famous wine regions owe their success largely to the Brit­ish public and its sometimes rather peculiar tastes.

This applies particularly to the wines of Bordeaux and several other French regions (Burgundy, Champagne, Provence and the Loire уаllеу), as well as to some Moselle, Alsace, Italian and Span­ish wines. After King Неnry 11 married Eleanor of Aqui­taine (formerly queen consort of King Louis VII of France) in 1152, the English court received as а dowry the Duchy of Aquitaine (now Bordeaux) and other domains in France.

Еven more importantly, after the royal marriage, French wines bесаmе fash­ionable across the Channel. Up until 1453, when France recovered Bordeaux after the end of the Hundred Years' War, the region was а main supp1ier of wine for the Eng1ish market. Bordeaux wine, however, remained in demand, regard1ess of the recurrent Anglo-French conf1icts - taste саn sometimes be even more conservative than Brit­ish po1icy. А specia1 f1eet was set up to service the wine trade, and in 1373 it numbered 300 ships.

Quite often the grape harvests were insufficient to meet demand оn the Eng1ish market and merchants offered wine of lower qua1ity from periphera1 re­gions (haut pays). The Eng1ish called those wines 'c1aret' . According to some sources from the period, the perfect wine worthy of the English pa1ate had to bе 'c1ear as the tears of а penitent to the very bot­tom of the glass, and green as buffalo' s horn.    Оndrinking it was to descend as impetuous1y as thun­der, sweet-tasted as an a1mond, creeping 1ike аsquirre1, 1eaping 1ike а roe-buck, strong as а Cis­tercian monastery bui1ding, scintillating 1ike а spark of fire, subt1e as the logic of the schoo1 of Petit-Pont in Paris, de1icate as fine si1k, and co1der than crysta1' (С. Anne Wi1son, Food aпd Driпk in Britaiп, 1976).

This inspired description c1ear1y suggests that the Eng1ish 1iked wines that were tart and tannic or, in other words, young. In the E1izabethan Age (1558-1603), most wines were imported from France, but there were a1so some from the region of the Moselle and Rhine, Crete, Spain, southern Ita1y and other coun­tries. The picture changed in the seventeenth centu­ry. Rising taxes оn both sides of the Channe1 and the subsequent war of Eng1and and the United Provinces ofthe Nether1ands against France (1689­-1697) brought to London the fashion of sweet Por­tuguese wines from the Douro region fortified with brandy.

 Drinking port was regarded as virtually а patriotic duty. In the drunken British eighteenth century, it was considered entire1y norma1 for а gent1eman to irnbibe two or even three bott1es of port with or af­ter his dinner. Spanish Jerez (sherris or sherry), which was known as 'sack' as ear1y as the reign of Неrnу VПI (1509-1547), bесаmе increasing1y рор­u1ar, too. Other wines gained from the cornp1icated Anglo-French re1ations, among them Madeira, Ma1aga and the Ita1ian Marsa1a.

Meanwhi1e, tаnу Britons - in particu1ar, representatives of the upper c1asses - remained fervent lovers of some French wines and were willing to рау their high prices. This distinguished cliente1e enhanced the prestige of some of today's 1eading producers and appe11ations fют Bordeaux, such as Chateau Haut-Brion, Cha­teau Margaux, Chateau Lafite and Chateau Latour, as we11 as some Burgundian brands.