Chronicles of Time

My grandfather – the destiny obliges him to resume the Domaine.

It is the circumstances, more than his personal taste, that brought my grandfather, Maxime PARENT, to be a vintner. Wishing a military career, (he completed his studies in St Cyr), the circumstances ruined his plans.
At first, the premature death, in 1908 of his father Johannès; then the war of 1914 – 1918, and especially the disappearance of his young brother Alfred.
Everything contributed in changing his fate. Gabriel was the eldest of 3 boys, followed by Maxim and then Alfred.

It was Alfred, the youngest brother who intended to start the family business again. He studied international trade and had stayed in England, then moved to Germany where he had numerous friends. Alfred died in May 1915. Maxime came back from the war four years later and carried out his duty at the age of 32 years : he managed his part of the Domaine ( about 5 hectares at that time). In fact both remaining brothers, Maxime and Gabriel shared the Domaine : Gabriel took a part of “Monthelie” (today exploited by Annick PARENT) and Maxime, my grandfather keeping “Pommard”.

Reflection of a time when the machinery did not exist…

My grandfather practised so the main part of his activity during the period between both world wars (1919 – 1939), time of restoration and preservation of the exploitation, (without expansion …the economic crisis of 1929 recreating an even more difficult situation). The rhythm of the work was then very different from what we know at present: no machinery to cultivate the vineyards. Horses were an indispensable element for ploughing the land along with the trailers during the seasons. In other words, hand labour was required. Three wine growers were employed full time. One of them was in charge of looking after the horses and lived next to the house. The harvested wine did not leave the Domaine right away, for example : to the consumer and the distributor = it was sold in trunks (barrels of 228 litters) exclusively to traders by means of local brokers.
A cooper worker worked part-time in order to restore and maintain the barrels before the grape harvest. During the better years, we bottled a small quantity of wine for the “Réserve Personnelle”, the owners and sometimes given as gifts. These invaluable vintages were piled in a special vault in the cellar.
At this time, the leader of the exploitation was capable of doing his accounts, the administrative works and the purchasing of products or materials. It was not necessary to go looking for new clients. The clients always came to him.


The staff did not only work the land, but did a variety of other houseworks – gathered hay for the horses, cut wood for the fireplace, planted seeds in order to have potatoes, cereals, etc…and help and maintain the house.

The objective of course was to keep the vineyard very well-maintained, to harvest it and produce excellent wine, to benefit from the best for the prosperity of the family and for all those who worked on it.

Weather conditions varied of course :
spring frosts (freezing), devastating thunderstorms of hail did not help balance of our economy.

The decrease in sales over certain years were also, of course a big problem.

BEFORE WINTER : we dug up the vineyards (practically covered the actual vines in order to protect them from the frost).

DURING SPRING : we dug-up the earth. Pruning, tying down, disbudding, tying up, was done by hand…which is still practised today !

The copper-spraying against the mildew, then the sulphurisation against the odium, were made with atomisers that had to be sprayed “behind our backs” because of the dangerously strong and unclean chemicals.

The topping and trimming of the vines were done with shears.

During spring and summer weeds were removed. We also went “bouècher” = scratch the ground among the vinestocks with a hoe.

At this time, there were a lot of fruit trees in the vineyards (almond trees, cherry trees and especially peach trees, which after their delicate pink bloom, decorated the landscape and gave magnificent and delicious fruits. We had several of these trees, mainly in two vineyards in Pommard : “Les Argillières and “les Chanlins”. Lulune’s vineyard (“Beaune Montrevenots”) planted in white and produced an excellent table wine…