Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
1.10
To protect the commercial reputation of these goods, local legislators passed
laws to prevent the adulteration of local produce by the addition of inferior
introduced goods or ingredients. These laws punished the adulteration of goods
and established systems of marking approved local goods with marks certifying
their quality (eg wool marks for cloth, hallmarks, for goods made from precious
metals). Where the reputation of local goods was attributable to the skills and
technology of local artisans, associations or guilds of master workers grew up.
The taxing authorities saw an advantage in preserving the skills and revenue-
earning capacities of these guilds and conferred upon them a monopoly of
manufacture. To regulate this monopoly, the guilds developed service marks, or
heraldic-type designs, which were placed upon goods produced by guild
members.
1.11
Prior to the Industrial Revolution in Britain, which commenced in the eight-
eenth century, industrial production was on a small scale. The corporate form of
industrial organisation did not yet exist. Until this time, the principal products
that entered international trade were primary products, such as minerals and
agricultural produce, and simple manufactured goods, such as pottery and
woven fabrics. In the competition to earn revenues from the international trade
that was developing at that time, it became apparent that the products of
particular regions were more saleable than comparable products from other
regions, because of their superior quality. This superior quality resulted either
from natural geographic advantages, such as climate and geology (eg Seville
oranges, Kentish hops, Roquefort cheese); recipes and food processing tech-
niques local to a region (eg Kyoto bean cakes, Malmesbury mead, Frankfurter
sausages) or indigenous manufacturing skills (eg Delft ceramic ware, Bohemian
crystal ware).
1.12
The historical origins of GIs laws are usually traced back to the mediaeval
French laws which conferred a number of advantages upon Bordeaux wine
producers (see van Caenegem, 2003). Principal among these were the
privilège
de la descente
and the
privilège de la barrique
. The former excluded non-Bordeaux
wines from the Bordeaux wine market until 11 November of each year. The
effect of this was to give Bordeaux wines an advantage in dealings with the
lucrative English and Dutch markets as end-of-year dealings were vulnerable to
the icing-up of northern ports. Non-Bordeaux wines were marked as such and
sequestered in designated wine cellars in the city. This had the effect of
developing administrative arrangements for identifying the geographic origins
of wines.
1.13
The
privilège de la barrique
reinforced the commercial advantage of Bordeaux
wines as the only wines entitled to a barrel made of superior wood and of
