Graves

Archaeology dates the first vines here, at the gates of Bordeaux, to around 40 AD. In the Middle Ages vines were planted in and around the city on poor, stony land unfit for other crops. After Eleanor of Aquitaine married the future Henry II of England in 1152, the city's suburbs gained a "Privilege" that barred outside wine until every barrel of "town wine" was sold. From the sixteenth to the eighteenth century large estates were formed, and "vins de Graves" stood for Bordeaux wine itself in exports to England and northern Europe. The philosopher Montesquieu owned Château de La Brède here. The appellation was recognised by decree on 4 March 1937. Vine diseases, the frosts of 1956 and the growth of Bordeaux and Langon cut the vineyard back; it regained its historic area in the 2000s.

The Graves forms a band about 10 km wide on the left bank of the Garonne, from north of Bordeaux to south-east of Langon, wrapping around the enclave of Sauternes and Barsac; it covers 42 communes. Its name means gravel. Pyrenean glaciers ground down rock in the Quaternary ice ages, and the Garonne carried it here and left it in terraces. What remains are gravel mounds of every size: pebbles, stones and coarse gravel, and sand mixed with silt and clay, lying in places on limestone but mostly on pure sand, alios or clay. The soils are very permeable, and their slopes and many small tributary streams drain them. Pine forest to the west shelters the vines, the Garonne ventilates them against heat and damp, and Atlantic influence moderates spring frost.

The specification describes reds in which Cabernet Sauvignon brings aroma and structure and Merlot perfume and suppleness: red fruit with spicy, toasted notes when young, elegant and structured, sometimes finely smoky with age, at their best after five to ten years. Dry whites are elegant and fleshy. Sémillon gives floral notes and natural richness, Sauvignon Blanc liveliness, Muscadelle a light musky note, often with citrus and sometimes exotic or minty notes. It ties full ripeness in the reds to the warm, stony, infertile soils, and the finesse of the whites to sandier or clay-matrix soils.

Unlike the Médoc, the Graves makes both colours. Merlot covers 59 % of the red vineyard and Cabernet Sauvignon 33 %. The whites are mostly Sémillon and Sauvignon Blanc and come in two styles, fresh and citrus-scented, or richer and aged in barrel. Sweeter whites from late-picked grapes are sold under the separate Graves Supérieures appellation. The rules require at least 5,000 vines per hectare and exclude plots exposed to spring frost because they lie far from the Garonne or are enclosed by forest.

The Graves classification of 1959 named 16 estates. All of them lie in the northern part that became Pessac-Léognan in 1987, so none lies in the rest of the Graves.