Costières de Nîmes (AOC)
| Wine region | |
 |
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| Official name | Costières de Nîmes |
|---|---|
| Type | Appelation d'origine contrôlé |
| Year established | 1986 |
| Years of wine industry | Over 2,000 |
| Country | France |
| Part of | Rhône Valley |
| Other regions in Rhône Valley | Côtes du Rhône, right bank. Coteaux du Languedoc |
| Climate region | Mediterranean |
| Soil conditions | Quartzite pebble with alluvia |
| Size of planted vineyards | 4,185 |
| Grapes produced | Red/rosé: Syrah, Grenache, Mourvèdre, Carignan, Cinsault. White: Grenache blanc, Marsanne, Roussanne, Clairette, Bourboulenc, Macabeo, Rolle |
| Wine produced | Red, white, rosé |
| Comments | Ha: hectares, hl: hectolitres, hl/ha: hectolitres per hectare |
Costières de Nîmes is an Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée (AOC) for wines that are produced in an area between the ancient city of Nîmes and the western Rhône delta, in the French department of the Gard. Formerly part of the Languedoc region of France, as the wines more resemble those of the Rhône valley in character than of the Languedoc, it is now part of the Rhone wine area and administered by the Rhône Wine committee which has its headquarters in Avignon.
Wines from the region have been produced for over two millennia and were consumed by the Greeks in pre-Roman times, making it one of the oldest vineyards in Europe. The area was settled by veterans of Julius Caesar's campaigns in Egypt, and bottles of Costières de Nîmes bear the symbol of the Roman settlement at Nîmes, a crocodile chained to a palm tree. According to a chart in the kitchen of the Palais des Papes in Avignon, many of the towns in what is now the Costieres de Nîmes region were the main suppliers of wine to the Popes of that era.
Formerly known as Costières du Gard, a VDQS, the wine achieved AOC status in 1986 and was renamed Costières de Nîmes 1989. In 1998 the growers' organization (the syndicate) requested that the appellation should be attached to the Rhône wine region as their wines are more reflective of the typical characteristics of Rhône wines than of the Languedoc region to which the area geographically belongs.INAO, the French authority which regulates the country's appellations, assigns each appellation to a regional committee which is in charge of approving wines from that appellation. This list is a legal text published by the French ministry of agriculture. The move of Costières de Nîmes to the regional committee of the Rhône valley was effected in the 19 July 2004 version of this list. Up until the version of 8 July 1998, which the 2004 version superseded, Costières de Nîmes was assigned to the regional committee of Languedoc-Roussillon. Interestingly enough, the immediately adjacent AOC of Clairette de Bellegarde remains listed as a Languedoc AOC.
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