French wine growing region Jura

The Jura region and its French vineyards

The Revermont vineyards stretch 80Km across the Jura region, from north to south.

The "Bon Pays", or "Good Country" as we call it here, reveals its treasures to us: four Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée - so-called AOC classification - French vineyards (Côtes du Jura, L’Étoile, Arbois and Arbois-Pupillin, Château-Chalon), two products with AOC status (Crément du Jura and Macvin du Jura), and five grape varieties (Chardonnay, Savagnin, Poulsard, Trousseau and Pinot Noir) show a wide range of excellent French wines and different wine growing areas.
 

The art of wine-growing

Arbois, Salins and Poligny are reputed for its excellent local wine produce and its wine vineyards. Château-Chalon, the homeland of Yellow Wine, Pupillin, the capital of the Ploussard grape, proud of its difference, Gevingey or Rotalier are all villages characteristics of the southern Jura vineyards.

The Jura region of France is a land of tradition, the homeland of several generations of wine-growers. The techniques of vinification and planting, passed down from father to son, or taught in the region's brilliant professional federations, are the essential quality of French vineyards.

Recognition of French wine value

The wines of the Jura region have a reputation stretching back many centuries in France. Written documents prove that wine-growing was already being practised in the 10th century in Arbois and in the 16th in Château-Chalon.
For centuries, the land-owning nobles developed a tradition of quality on their wine-making. Nevertheless, the boom in the wine trade was the fruit of real social cohesion: alongside the large land-owners, the more modest wine-growers were able to group together into cooperatives in 1906: The Coopérative Fruitière Vinicole d’Arbois was the first wine cooperative in France.
The wine producers of Jura continued in this vein within a number of organisations, ultimately leading to the creation of the Appellations d'Origine Contrôlée wines. Arbois was the first wine of the Jura region to be awarded this distinction, on 15 May 1936, closely followed by Château-Chalon a few days later.

The men who have left their mark on the French vineyards in the Jura region

Louis Pasteur, often regarded as the father of modern oenology because of his work on the fermentation of wine.

Alexis Millardet, inventor of the French wine Bordeaux mixture.

Charles Rouget, the author of a remarkable ampelography that lists all of the grape varieties of the Jura.

Joseph Girard, defender of the Appellations d'Origine Contrôlée.

>> See the grape varieties and the famous French wines of the Jura region