Juliénas

🇫🇷 France

AOC Rare find

Cru 1938 - Named for Julius Caesar, 580 hectares where Roman legions planted the first Gamay

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Region profile

History

Named for Julius Caesar who occupied the region during the Gallic Wars (58-50 BC) - Roman soldiers planted the first vines here. The Cellier de la Vieille Église, a decommissioned 1868 church, became Beaujolais' most famous tasting cellar in 1954 when the village purchased it for 1 franc. Inside, Bacchus statues replaced saints and wine barrels fill the nave. The annual Prix Victor Peyret (named for a 19th-century local winegrower) has been awarded since 1959 to celebrities who defend French wine culture.

Climate
Most geologically complex terroir in Beaujolais: granite, schist, diorite, blue volcanic stone, clay; 200-400m elevation creates multiple microclimates; soils change every few hundred meters
Signature wines
Domaine du Clos du Fief "Prestige" - Michel Tête's fourth-generation estate, uses Burgundian oak aging and extended maceration, 15€ wine that drinks like 40€ Côte de Nuits
What sets it apart
The only Beaujolais Cru where you taste wine in a church; the Prix Victor Peyret celebrity award has created ambassadors from paleontologists to Parisian actors

Facts

  • 580 hectares across 4 communes (Juliénas, Jullié, Émeringes, Pruzilly)
  • 100+ cooperative members and 60 independent growers
  • annual "Prix Victor Peyret" awards - past winners include actor Pierre Arditi, paleontologist Yves Coppens (who discovered Lucy), and novelist Noëlle Châtelet
  • AOC granted March 11, 1938

Region profile from the Wine Memories wine-data corpus · verified January 2026