Page 5 - IAV Digital Magazine #499

iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine
Bottle of Cognac
From 1762 Sells
For $146,000
By Ben Hooper
May 28 (UPI) -- A 1762 vintage bot- tle of cognac, one of the oldest sur- viving cognacs in the world, sold for $146,000 at an online auction.
The Gautier cognac, one of only three surviv- ing bottles of the spirit, was sold Thursday by Sotheby's auction house.
The auction house said the
bottle is known as the "grand frere," or "big brother," as it is the largest of three surviving bottles from the collection. The bottle known as "little brother" was sold at a New York auction in 2014 and the "lit- tle sister" is on display at the Gautier Museum in the Cognac region of France.
The former owner of the bottles said they were brought to the
family by a man named Alphonse, who was adopted by the former owner's great- grandparents. The family story holds that Alphonse left home to work in the Cognac region and returned with a cart full of bottles a decade later, before his death in World War I.
"The Gautier 1762 is renowned and revered across the world as a cognac that transcends the world of spirits collecting," Jonny Fowle, Sotheby's spirits specialist, said in the auc- tion announce- ment.
"This bottle repre- sents not only an example of pre- phylloxera viticul- ture, but also of early cask matu- ration from the dawn of Gautier's production and even precedes the French Revolution."
iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine