Études Sur La Vin

Pasteur, Louis. Études Sur La Vin. 1866.

PASTEUR, L [Louis (1822-1895)]

Études sur le vin. Ses maladies causes qui les provoquent procédés nouveaux pour le conserver et pour le vieillir.

Paris : L'imprimerie Impériale, 1866. First Edition.

Octavo (235x155mm) half bound burgundy, pebble-grain morocco cloth, marbled boards, viii, 264pp;  π⁴, 1-16⁸, 17⁴.  Eleven (ten numbered) in text wood engravings, 32 out of text colour lithograpic plates. In French.

Boards edges lightly worn; spine lightly sunned; upper joint cloth splitting but firm; top-edges a trifle dusty; light occasional foxing mostly to the gutters on a few page, not affecting the plates or text.


In 1863, the French Emperor Napoleon III encouraged Pasteur to continue his work looking at the process of fermentation to improve the quality of French wine and reduce spoilage and sour wine.  Pasteur had already published papers looking at lactic acid fermentation, alcoholic fermentation and the role of yeast.  His research showed that the growth of micro-organisms was responsible for fermentation (not decomposition as suggested by Liebig and others) and that treating liquids with heat would kill most such micro-organisms; a process now known as 'pasteurisation'.  In 1865 Pasteur patented the process, to fight the "diseases" of wine before finishing this book which also looks at oxidation and other "diseases" of wine.

Pasteur's first major published work. 


An excellent First Edition of one of the fundamental and consequential texts of wine science.

§  Oberlé, Fastes, 985; Simon BV 22; Cagle 379; Crahan 674; cf Bitting 358 noting the second edition.