Dom

Dom (title)

Dom is a title of respect prefixed to the given name. It derives from Latin Dominus.It is used in English for certain Benedictine and Carthusian monks, and for members of certain communities of Canons Regular. Examples include Benedictine monks of the English Benedictine Congregation...

 Pierre Pérignon, O.S.B., (c. 1638–14 September 1715) was a French

French people

The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...

 Benedictine monk

Monk

A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of monks, while always maintaining some degree of physical separation from those not sharing the same purpose...

 who made important contributions to the production and quality of Champagne wine in an era when the region's wines were predominantly still and red. Popular myths frequently, but erroneously, credit him with the invention of sparkling

Sparkling wine

Sparkling wine is a wine with significant levels of carbon dioxide in it making it fizzy. The carbon dioxide may result from natural fermentation, either in a bottle, as with the méthode champenoise, in a large tank designed to withstand the pressures involved , or as a result of carbon dioxide...

 Champagne, which didn't become the dominant style of Champagne until mid-19th century.

The famous champagne Dom Pérignon

Dom Pérignon (wine)

Dom Pérignon is a brand of vintage Champagne produced by the Champagne house Moët & Chandon and serves as that house's prestige champagne. It is named after Dom Pérignon, a Benedictine monk who was an important quality pioneer for Champagne wine but who, contrary to popular myths, did not discover...

, the préstige cuvée

Cuvee

Cuvée is a French wine term derived from cuve, meaning vat or tank. The term cuvée is used with several different meanings, more or less based on the concept of a tank of wine put to some purpose:...

 of Moët & Chandon, is named after him.

Biography

Pierre Pérignon was born to a clerk of a local judge in the town of Saint-Menehould in the Champagne region

Champagne (province)

The Champagne wine region is a historic province within the Champagne administrative province in the northeast of France. The area is best known for the production of the sparkling white wine that bears the region's name...

 of northern France. When he was 19 he entered the Benedictine Order, first doing his novitiate

Novitiate

Novitiate, alt. noviciate, is the period of training and preparation that a novice monastic or member of a religious order undergoes prior to taking vows in order to discern whether they are called to the religious life....

 at the Abbey of Saint-Vannes

Congregation of St. Vanne

The Congregation of St. Vanne or Congregation of St. Vanne and St. Hydulphe , sometimes also known as the Vannists was a Benedictine reform movement centred on Lorraine. It was formally established in 1604 on the initiative of Dom Didier de La Cour, prior of the Abbey of St...

 near the town of Verdun

Verdun

Verdun is a city in the Meuse department in Lorraine in north-eastern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department.Verdun is the biggest city in Meuse, although the capital of the department is the slightly smaller city of Bar-le-Duc.- History :...

. In 1668, he transferred to the Abbey of Hautvillers

Hautvillers

Hautvillers is a commune in the Marne department in north-eastern France....

 near the town of Épernay

Épernay

Épernay is a commune in the Marne department in northern France. Épernay is located some 130 km north-east of Paris on the main line of the Eastern railway to Strasbourg...

. He served as Cellarer of the Abbey until his death in 1715. Under his stewardship, the Abbey flourished and doubled the size of its vineyard holding. As a sign of honor and respect, Dom Pierre was buried in a section of the Abbey cemetery

Cemetery

A cemetery is a place in which dead bodies and cremated remains are buried. The term "cemetery" implies that the land is specifically designated as a burying ground. Cemeteries in the Western world are where the final ceremonies of death are observed...

 traditionally reserved only for abbots.

Influence of Champagne production

In his era the in-bottle refermentation

Fermentation (wine)

The process of fermentation in wine turns grape juice into an alcoholic beverage. During fermentation, yeast interact with sugars in the juice to create ethanol, commonly known as ethyl alcohol, and carbon dioxide...

 that gives sparkling wine its sparkle was an enormous problem for winemakers. When the weather cooled off in the autumn, refermentation would sometimes keep fermentable sugar

Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline carbohydrates, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose, characterized by a sweet flavor.Sucrose in its refined form primarily comes from sugar cane and sugar beet...

s from being converted to alcohol. If the wine was bottled in this state, it became a literal time bomb. When the weather warmed in the spring, dormant yeast roused themselves and began generating carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalently bonded to a single carbon atom...

 that would at best push the cork out of the bottle, and at worst explode, starting a chain reaction. Nearby bottles, also under pressure, would break from the shock of the first breakage, and so on, which was a hazard to employees and to that year's production. Dom Pérignon thus tried to avoid refermentation.

In 1718, Canon

Canon (priest)

A canon is a priest or minister who is a member of certain bodies of the Christian clergy subject to an ecclesiastical rule ....

 Godinot published a set of wine making rules that were said to be established by Dom Pérignon. Among these rules was the detail that fine wine should only be made from Pinot Noir

Pinot Noir

Pinot noir is a black wine grape variety of the species Vitis vinifera. The name may also refer to wines created predominantly from Pinot noir grapes...

. Pérignon was not fond of white grapes because of their tendency to enter refermentation. Other rules that Godinot included was Pérignon's guidance to aggressively prune vines so that they grow no higher than three feet and produce a smaller crop. Harvest should be done in cool, damp conditions (such as early morning) with every precaution being taken to ensure that the grapes don't bruise or break. Rotten and overly large grapes were to be thrown out. Pérignon did not allow grapes to be trodden and favored the use of multiple presses to help minimize macerations

Maceration (wine)

Maceration is the winemaking process where the phenolic materials of the grape— tannins, coloring agents and flavor compounds— are leached from the grape skins, seeds and stems into the must. Maceration is the process by which the red wine receives its red color, since 99% of all grape juice is...

 of the juice and the skins.

Dom Pérignon was also an early advocate of winemaking using only natural process without the addition of foreign substances. Today we might call this "organic" winemaking to distinguish it from other commonly used winemaking methods

Winemaking

Winemaking, or vinification, is the production of wine, starting with selection of the grapes or other produce and ending with bottling the finished wine. Although most wine is made from grapes, it may also be made from other fruit or non-toxic plant material...

, though the word "organic

Organic movement

The organic movement broadly refers to the organizations and individuals involved worldwide in the promotion of organic farming, which is a more sustainable mode of agriculture...

" connotes modern cultural and political views, in addition to techniques for sustainable agriculture, that Dom Pérignon most likely did not hold.

Misconceptions and myths

The quote attributed to him—"Come quickly, I am drinking the stars!"—is supposedly what he said when tasting the first sparkling champagne. However, the first appearance of that quote appears to have been in a print advertisement in the late 19th century.

While the Dom did work tirelessly and successfully to improve the quality and renown of the still wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

s of Champagne, he did not invent sparkling wine, nor was he the first to make champagne. Indeed he worked hard to prevent a secondary fermentation which was seen as a fault and most likely to break the wine bottles. There is documentary evidence that sparkling wine was first intentionally produced by English scientist and physician Christopher Merret.

A major proponent of the misconceptions surrounding Dom Pérignon came from one of his successors at the Abbey of Hautvillers, Dom Groussard, who in 1821 gave an account of Dom Pérignon "inventing" Champagne among other exaggerated tales about the Abbey in order to garner historical importance and prestige for the church. The myths about Pérignon being the first to use corks

Cork (material)

Cork is an impermeable, buoyant material, a prime-subset of bark tissue that is harvested for commercial use primarily from Quercus suber , which is endemic to southwest Europe and northwest Africa...

 and being able to name the precise vineyard by tasting a single grape likely originated from Groussard's account.

Prior to blending he would taste the grape

Grape

A grape is a non-climacteric fruit, specifically a berry, that grows on the perennial and deciduous woody vines of the genus Vitis. Grapes can be eaten raw or they can be used for making jam, juice, jelly, vinegar, wine, grape seed extracts, raisins, molasses and grape seed oil. Grapes are also...

s without knowing the source vineyard to avoid influencing his perceptions. References to his "blind tasting of wine" have led to the common misconception that Dom Pérignon was blind.

Contrary to popular belief, Dom Pérignon did not introduce blending to Champagne wines but rather the innovation of blending the grapes prior to sending them to press.