[VINS DE BEAUNE] Carnet d'expédition de vins de la Maison Patriarche et les associés Patriarche-Misserey

Ledger of wine sales for shipment kept by a Beaune wine-trading house, 63 leaves (124 pp.) written in ink, followed by 26 blank leaves. The entries span the years 1787-1795, followed by a few pages dated 1809 containing draft letters, often sent from Koblenz, relating to delivery, probably drafted by intermediaries.

A rare order book from a wine-trading house, probably the Patriarche, constituting one of the earliest surviving records of their trading activity. This unpublished, first-hand source fills gaps in our knowledge of the house's early years, shedding light on export routes and the prices charged for the various appellations and vintages.

Limp vellum with ties, the covers made from a reused skin bearing text in ink, the lower cover split in several places, with tears affecting the spine in two places.

The register covers the years 1787-1795 for a trading house that benefited from an “edict issued in 1776 under Turgot's influence, which fully liberalized the free circulation and trade of wine throughout the kingdom” (Jean-Marc Bonnefoy, Le monde de la vigne dans la région de Nolay de la fin du XVIIIe siècle à 1914, p. 95). Entries are recorded from September 1787 onward, only a few months after Thomas Jefferson's visit to the region, during which he delighted in the wines of Meursault, Pommard and Volnay, as recorded in his travel notes (Notes of a Tour into the Southern Parts of France).

The eighteenth century saw the founding of some fifteen trading houses, among them Patriarche, established in 1780. Several elements point to this firm in particular: a bibliographer's note on the paste-down, together with an 1809 letter accompanying the register, addressed to Patriarche et Misserey by a delinquent debtor pleading for an extension to settle his account. Between 1808 and 1811, the merchants' directory indeed lists Patriarche et Misserey as partners under Beaune.

Several grades appear (first, second and third quality, as well as old wine) along with the true appellations of origin, a practice that became widespread from the 1730s onward: Meursault, Beaune, Volnay, Pommard, Chassagne, namely. The earliest vintage recorded dates from 1784. The clientele consisted mainly of wine professionals (merchants, dealers and innkeepers), with the remainder drawn from the social elite: holders of offices and official posts, wealthy private individuals, or clergymen pooling their orders. Trade extended across northern and eastern France, occasionally Normandy, as well as Paris, Vienna, Turin, Brussels and Switzerland (Basel, Bern and Neuchâtel). Most orders are recorded in feuillettes, bottles or pièces, more rarely in quarteaux, while prices are generally given according to the quantity of a queue (around 500 bottles).

Business was brought in through various intermediaries, among them Canon Fromageot of Beaune, whose reputation was praised throughout Europe by Count von Rosenberg, a frequent presence in the register's entries for his numerous wine orders to be sent to Austria: “Count Rosen[berg] […] tells me that his correspondent for Burgundy wine is Abbé Fromageot, canon of Beaune, that a pièce costs him 240 livres tournois, and that I need only have it brought down the Rhône for him.” (Europäische Aufklärung Zwischen Wien und Triest. Die Tagebücher des Gouverneurs Karl Graf Zinzendorf, 1776-1782).

Certain bottles were sometimes to be marked, with monograms noted in the margins. Most orders are specific, at times cryptic (“neither old nor new”; “with body”; “no vintage specified, only the time at which it should be bottled - a full-bodied wine from Beaune or Pommard [sic] is wanted”), and include vintages, colour, or even rather amusing remarks: “not good, do not ship” (!). 

An exceedingly rare wine-trade archival document from the turbulent times of the Revolution and the Directory, offering new data on major houses whose names endure and still flourish today: Patriarche and Misserey.