page_title: Chartreuse (liqueur)
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Chartreuse (liqueur) / History
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Alambics de distillation anciens modèles des caves de la Chartreuse (ne sont plus utilisés en production courante) English: Old-style pot stills of the Chartreuse (no longer in use for regular production)
context_page_description: Chartreuse is a French liqueur available in green and yellow versions that differ in taste and alcohol content. The liqueur has been made by the Carthusian Monks since 1737 according to the instructions set out in a manuscript given to them by François Annibal d'Estrées in 1605. It was named after the monks' Grande Chartreuse monastery, located in the Chartreuse Mountains in the general region of Grenoble in France. The liqueur is produced in their distillery in the nearby town of Voiron. It is composed of distilled alcohol aged with 130 herbs, plants and flowers. It is one of the handful of liqueurs that continue to age and improve in the bottle.
context_section_description: According to tradition, a marshal of artillery to French king Henry IV, François Hannibal d'Estrées, presented the Carthusian monks at Vauvert, near Paris, with an alchemical manuscript that contained a recipe for an "elixir of long life" in 1605. The recipe eventually reached the religious order's headquarters at the Grande Chartreuse monastery, in Voiron, near Grenoble. It has since then been used to produce the "Elixir Végétal de la Grande Chartreuse". The formula is said to include 130 herbs, plants and flowers and secret ingredients combined in a wine alcohol base.
  The book The Practical Hotel Steward (1900) states that green chartreuse contains "cinnamon, mace, lemon balm, dried hyssop flower tops, peppermint, thyme, costmary, arnica flowers, genepi, and angelica roots", and that yellow chartreuse is, "Similar to above, adding cardamom seeds and socctrine aloes." However the recipe remains a secret. The monks intended their liqueur to be used as medicine. The recipe was further enhanced in 1737 by Brother Gérome Maubec.
  The beverage soon became popular, and in 1764 the monks adapted the elixir recipe to make what is now called Green Chartreuse.
  In 1793, the monks were expelled from France along with all other Religious Orders and manufacture of the liqueur ceased. A copy of the manuscript was made and kept at the Monastery. The original left with the monks. On the way there, the monk was arrested and sent to prison in Bordeaux. He was not searched and was able to secretly pass the manuscript to one of his friends: Dom Basile Nantas. This friend was convinced that the order would remain in Spain and never come back and that the manufacturing of the liqueur would cease. He sold the manuscript to a pharmacist in Grenoble, Monsieur Liotard. In 1810, Napoleon ordered that all "secret" recipes of medicine be sent to the Ministry of Interior for review. The manuscript was sent and returned as "Refused" as it was not a secret but well known. At the death of the pharmacist, his heirs returned the manuscript to the monks who had been back at the Monastery since 1816.
  In 1838, they developed Yellow Chartreuse, a sweeter version of the Green Chartreuse, 40% alcohol liqueur (80° proof).
  The monks were again expelled from the monastery following a French law in 1903, and their real property, including the distillery, was confiscated by the government. The monks took their secret recipe to their refuge in Tarragona, Catalonia, and began producing their liqueurs with the same label, but with an additional label which said Liqueur fabriquée à Tarragone par les Pères Chartreux ("liquor manufactured in Tarragona by the Carthusian Fathers"). At the same time, the "Compagnie Fermière de la Grande Chartreuse", a corporation in Voiron that obtained the Chartreuse assets, produced a liqueur without benefit of the monks' recipe which they sold as Chartreuse. While the French corporation was acting legally in France, the monks successfully prevented the export of the liqueur to many other countries, since the order retained ownership of its foreign trademark registrations, largely because the recipe had been kept secret. On the night of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, one of the proposed dishes for First class was a Chartreuse-based dessert. Sales at the French company were very poor, and by 1929, it faced bankruptcy. A group of local businessmen in Voiron bought all the shares at a low price and sent them as a gift to the monks in Tarragona.
  After regaining possession of the distillery, the Carthusian brothers returned to the monastery with the tacit approval of the French government and began to produce Chartreuse once again. Despite the eviction law, when a mudslide destroyed the distillery in 1935, the French government assigned Army engineers to relocate and rebuild it at a location near Voiron where the monks had previously set up a distribution point. After World War II, the government lifted the expulsion order, making the Carthusian brothers once again legal French residents.
  Until the 1980s, there was another distillery at Tar
caption: Old style pot stills no longer in regular use, having been replaced by stainless steel stills
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