1855 Classification: All we know about it is wrong!

According to this article, all we think we know about the 1855 Classification of the Medoc is wrong, apart from the date '1855'.


http://www.wine.co.za/news/news.aspx?NEWSID=28037

Interesting. The history may be wrong, but are the classifications wrong now?

All serious claret lovers know the weak points of the 1855 classification - obvious under-performers, e.g. Rauzan-Gassies classed 2nd, and obvious over-performers, e.g. Palmer classed 3rd and Pontet-Canet classed 5th, and enjoy debating it. IMO the method used, i.e. comparative market values, was more objective and less open to dispute than the panel decisions used for classifying St.Émilion and the crus bourgeois.

If the 1855 left-bank classification were to be updated today using the market value method, most of the well known anomalies would be ironed out. To the extent that consumers pay attention to the classification in their purchasing decisions rather than to their own tasting experience and to critics' reviews, it can be argued that classification categories based on price tend to be self-perpetuating. Pomerol doesn't have a classification and doesn't seem to suffer from it.

Pomerol doesn't have a classification and doesn't seem to suffer from it.

The statement I make above is strictly true but I have just read an article in the RVF to the effect that the notorious Vichy government between 1940 & 1944 during WW2 Nazi domination did produce a classification of Pomerol for fiscal purposes. It was -

1er cru classé
Pétrus

2es crus classés
Certan, La Conseillante, L'Évangile, Petit-Village, Trotanoy, VCC

3es crus classés
Gazin, Lafleur

4es crus classés
Clos l'Église, Domaine de l'Église, La Fleur Pétrus, Le Gay, La Grave Trigant, Latour à Pomerol

5es crus classés
Beauregard, Clinet, Nénin, La Pointe, La Croix de Gay, Église-Clinet...............................

A classification now would be different. For example, I think that Église-Clinet and Lafleur would be rated higher nowadays and Le Pin didn't exist then.

Like many of Vichy's initiatives, good as well as bad, it was quickly discarded after the war.

Continuing my reading of the RVF article, I learn that there was a serious attempt to revise the Médoc classification in 1961. Details of the proposal were leaked in the Sud-Ouest newspaper, which may have helped to raise opposition and stop the revision.

The proposal was to reduce the five categories to three, namely -

Premiers grands crus exceptionnels
Premiers grands crus classés
Grands crus classés

The first category included Lafite-R, Latour, Margaux & Mouton-R

The second category -

Beychevelle
Brane-Cantenac
Calon-Ségur
Cantemerle
Cos d'Estournel
Ducru-B
Gruaud-L
Lascombes
Léoville LC, B & P
Lynch B
Montrose
Palmer
Pichon-L Baron & Comtesse
Pontet-Canet
Rauzan G & S
Talbot

And the third category incorporated then worthy crus bourgeois, such as -

Bel-Air-Marquis d'Aligre
Chasse-Spleen
D-G-Poujeaux
Gloria
G-G-Poujeaux
Labégorce
Lanessan
Meyney
de Pez
Phélan-S
Poujeaux
Siran

Siran ends the Sud-Ouest page and the following page is not reproduced so I am unable to check if Sociando-Mallet was there and to enumerate proposed drop-outs from the 1855 five categories.

Most of the 1961 proposal makes sense to me though some individual names are debatable on recent form.

My guess is that some the so-called "Super Seconds", e.g. Ducru-B, would resent being in the same category as, say, Rauzan-G. That may be one of the things which torpedoed the proposal.

[David M. Bueker]

My guess is that some the so-called "Super Seconds", e.g. Ducru-B, would resent being in the same category as, say, Rauzan-G. That may be one of the things which torpedoed the proposal.

That and Haut-Brion threatening to blow up the whole Medoc for being left out!

[Robin Garr]

That and Haut-Brion threatening to blow up the whole Medoc for being left out!

I wondered about that.

I've always said, being a recovering journalist and thus prone to over-generalization, that the most amazing thing about it is not that some circumstances have changed over the past 160 years, but that so much about it remains reasonably valid after all that time.

That and Haut-Brion threatening to blow up the whole Medoc for being left out!

I wondered about that.

I've always said, being a recovering journalist and thus prone to over-generalization, that the most amazing thing about it is not that some circumstances have changed over the past 160 years, but that so much about it remains reasonably valid after all that time.

The logic of excluding Haut-Brion was, of course, that it is not in Médoc. Obviously the influential Dillon family would not have been happy about that. Mouton-R's ability to get promoted in 1973 in an otherwise static classification was certainly not hindered by the fact that then President Pompidou was a former senior executive of Banque Rothschild.

Returning to the efforts of the wartime Vichy collaborator government to classify wine, I read that, as well as at Pomerol, they published a Médoc, Sauternes, cru bourgeois, St.Émilion and Burgundy classification. The first three adhered closely to the existing 1855 and 1932 classifications and the last two looked quite similar to the official classifications which subsequently followed. All these classifications, including Pomerol's, were made by the market value method. The then market values of the top right bank wines, like Ausone, Cheval Blanc, were at the level of 1er GCCs from the Médoc but Pétrus sold at no more than the Médoc 2ème GCCs. Things have changed there.

Interestingly Vichy also made a classification of crus from Provence. Here most of estate names listed are unknown to me and five are now out of production. This shows that quality wine production in Provence was then in its infancy and the estate pattern quite unstable, whereas the pattern of quality estates in Bordeaux and Burgundy has been established for at least 200 years and changes very little, other than quite small quality fluctuations up and down due to temporary under or over performance by owners and their teams.

[Robin Garr]

Fascinating analysis, Tim. Thanks!