William, the 10th Duke of Guyenne and Count of Poitou had by his wife a daughter, Eleanor, who was but 10 years old when her father died in the Holy Land. Eleanor was the eldest of his two daughters and became heir to the noble possessions of her grandfather, William the 9th Duke of Aquitaine, which consisted, amongst other territories, of Guienne and Gascony, Poitou, Biscay and many other territories from the Loire to the foot of the Pyrenees. He also arranged that his granddaughter, now Eleanor of Aquitaine, should be united in marriage with Louis le Jeune, son of Louis VI le Gros, King of France. This marriage was solemnised with great pomp at Bordeaux in 1137.

The marriage united the north and south of France under one sovereignty and soon after, the young Louis was summoned, at the age of 18, to the death bed of King Louis VI, and he and Eleanor became King and Queen of France.

Shortly after becoming Queen of France, Eleanor, as Duchess of Aquitaine, granted a charter for a monastery to be constructed as a commandery of the Hospitaller Order of the Knights of St John of Jerusalem on the current site of Château De La Ligne. The lease, with all the lands at La Ligne, made in 1154 was to last for 300 years until the end of the Hundred years’ War when Charles VII, who regained control of the province from the English, took possession of the lands and gave them to the Marquis de Chapelas who had aided his cause throughout the wars. The Hospitallers were expelled from the monastery.

On June 11th 1147, King Louis agreed to go on a crusade and Eleanor decided to accompany him for the peace of her own soul and to tend the wounded. During this crusade in the Holy Land and upon return to Paris, Eleanor caused much scandal by her behaviour with the young knights and divorce was eventually granted on March 11th 1152.

So after 16 years of wedlock, Eleanor was removed from the court of Louis, taking with her all those noble territories that had been annexed to the crown of France.

Eleanor, now in her early 30’s, was reputed to have retained great beauty as well as the immense wealth of her inheritance as Duchess of Aquitaine. Within 6 weeks of leaving Paris, she gave her hand to Henry Plantagenet, Count of Anjou. The marriage was celebrated with extraordinary magnificence at Bordeaux Cathedral on May 18th 1152, after which Henry took his pregnant bride to Normandy. Shortly after the death of King Stephen of England, on December 19th 1154, Henry and Eleanor were crowned King and Queen of England in Westminster Abbey.

Henry is alleged to have died of a broken heart at Fontevraud on July 6th 1189 when Eleanor entered a nunnery where she too died on March 21st 1204 at the age of 82.

From 1454 the de Chapelas family maintained an association with La Ligne for 328 years, building a renaissance style château comparable with those of the Loire and the north of France. They also created an exquisite garden from plans by the famous French architect Tourny, reputedly as beautiful as that of Versailles, and developed the vineyards left by the monks. The Marquis, Francois de Chapelas who was a descendant of the first family to be at La Ligne, was Treasurer of France. He married Marguerite de Pontac, daughter of Jean de Pontac who died in 1693. He was direct descendant of Arnaud I and Jean de Pontac, creators of château Haut Brion, known to the connoisseurs of good Bordeaux wine throughout the world.

Arnaud II de Pontac was Bishop of Bazas, a charitable man amongst the clergy who contributed much of his personal fortune to the renovation and upkeep of the Cathedral there and also to the poor. When he died in 1605, he requested that his heart be buried under the eastern alter of the church of Saint Eulalie in Lignan, the parish church where château de La Ligne is built and where the bishop had been born. The de Chapelas family, being local benefactors, were thus given the “droit de litre”, enabling them to display their coat of arms (still visible today) on the inner walls of the church for public celebrations and mortuaries.

Until 1900, Château de La Ligne possessed one of the most beautiful gardens of France. Sadly one of the twentieth century owners fell bankrupt and several years of vicissitude followed. Only a man with a passion for wine could revive this forgotten jewel and make a dream become a reality.

The estate was purchased by an Irish Businessman, Mr Terry Cross, on Saint Patrick’s Day 2000. An erstwhile or latter-day “oie sauvage”, Mr Cross has re-planted an 11 hectare vineyard in the best traditions of Bordeaux with the unique ambition to re-establish Château de La Ligne as a gem of the Bordeaux appellation.

While we can suppose that wine was produced on the lands surrounding the monastery at Château de la Ligne for quite some time before, the earliest written records of wine production at Château de La Ligne date from 1874 when the estate of 200 hectares produced 175 “tonneaux” (158,000 litres) of wine. The vineyard was the principle property in the district at that time and reputedly produced among the highest quality wines of the area.

The winemaking tradition has been associated with Lignan and the adjacent villages for centuries. Usually linked with the Roman legions, the production of wine is also closely connected to religious orders. Records of wine production can be traced back to the Middle Ages and the Benedictine monks at the nearby Abbey of La Sauve Majeure. Our neighbour, Château Carignan was established in 1452 and Châteaux de Seguin and de Mons are both 17th century dwellings.

The last production of Château de La Ligne was in 1956 when, following a historically severe winter in Bordeaux, the dead vines were uprooted and the vineyard transformed into meadow.