92/100 Decanter
92/100 Wine Enthusiast
92/100 Wine Spectator
92/100 CellarTracker
91/100 Jeff Leve, The Wine Cellar Insider
92/100 Wine Enthusiast (2013 vintage)
90/100 Wine Spectator (2013 vintage)

Wine Enthusiast "Rippling, ripe fruit counteracts deep mineral tones in this bold, brooding wine. Black plum and berry notes are spiced with anise and vanilla, but also shades of dried sage, thyme and earth."

The history of Château Maucoil began several centuries ago. Ancient documents state that its first occupants were Romans and that they set up a base there for Caesar’s legions.

Later, Joseph de La Pise, Lord of Maucoil and archivist of the House of Orange-Nassau, the Dutch royal family, inherited the estate and the castle which was built in 1624. From then on, winegrowing became an intrinsic part of the history of Château Maucoil.

A series of illustrious families successively took over the reins of the estate and helped to establish its reputation. Already owners of another Château, the Arnaud family, several generations of whom were born and raised in Châteauneuf-du-Pape, decided to purchase the estate in 1995. Bénédicte, the youngest daughter of the Arnaud family, took charge of the Château with her husband Charles Bonnet in 2009.

The 45 hectares of vines in the Châteauneuf-du-Pape appellation are tended in organic agriculture since 2011. The owners are aware of the estate’s privileged situation and unique terroir, so they allow the vines to grow in pace with the care, precision and patience that they devote to them. They are attentive to the soil and work in the traditional way without using chemical weed killers. At Château Maucoil they prefer to use ancient methods such as furrowing, forming mounds and ploughing. They tend our vineyard with maximum respect for the people and the environment.

Châteauneuf-du-Pape is a historic village between the towns of Orange and Avignon, in France's southern Rhône Valley. It is famous for powerful, full-bodied red wines made predominantly from the classic southern Rhône grape trio: Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre. These three varieties are behind the vast majority of the appellation's red wines, although a total of eighteen are approved for use – a mix of red and white grape varieties.

The name Châteauneuf-du-Pape means "new castle of the Pope", and harks back to the early 14th Century, when Avignon was chosen as the new home for the Pope's court. The incumbent Pope at that time was Clement V, whose name also features in the ancient and prestigious Château Pape Clément in Graves. The town's name may be drenched in history, but as a wine title it has been prestigious for less than a century. Up until the early 20th century, the town's wines were anonymously grouped together with others from the Avignon area. This all changed in the 1920s, when Baron Pierre Le Roy de Boiseaumarié (owner of Château Fortia) drafted a set of quality-focused production conditions for the town's wines – a document which became the precursor of France's famous appellation system. The official Châteauneuf-du-Pape appellation title declared in June 1929 was one of the country's very first, and remains one of the most prestigious even today.

Southern Rhone Red Blend refers to a wide range of grape varieties often blended together to make wines in the southern reaches of the Rhone Valley in the south of France. While the blend could theoretically consist of any of a wide range of grape varieties, it is usually made up of Grenache, Syrah and Mourvedre, in varying proportions, typically with Grenache and Syrah as the dominant partners.

The Wine Odyssey