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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Le “plaisir sucré” de la duchesse : un point sur la production du « galant de Madame » à la fin du Moyen Âge. https://preo.u-bourgogne.fr/crescentis/index.php?id=1176

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Among the range of products elaborated in the Dukes of Burgundy vineyards at the end of the Middle Ages, the galant is first quoted in 1383. This paper strives to shed new light upon the sources in which the galant appears, i.e. the accountability documentation of the Dukes’ vineyards. Our research focuses on two demesnes located near Dijon: Talant and Chenôve.The study of this rare product (2-4% of total production), which was certainly flavored with gentian, shows that the notion of fortified wine should be reconsidered for the 14th and 15th centuries. The galant was obtained only by heating white grape must in a cauldron, searching to reach a diminution of one- or two-thirds of the basic volume. The process of its making brings the galant closer to the category of “robs”. Imported from Arabian medicine knowledge, robs are reductions of fruits, often grapes, that we frequently refer to as “vin cuit” in pre-modern pharmacopeia manuals. We can submit the hypothesis that the galant was neither an aperitif nor a product particularly prized by the Duchesses of Burgundy for its sweetness, but rather a medicinal product kin with the “cold” nature of the female body, according to the precepts of medieval medicine.