A Guide to Champagne Bottle Sizes
Bottle Volumes for Champagne and How Many Glasses Each One Yields
Sep 3, 2009
From the moment of legend when Champagne was first discovered by the French Benedictine monk Dom Pérignon (1638-1715)—who reputedly announced to his brethren, “Come quickly! I am drinking stars!”—the great sparkling wine has been surrounded by an air of delightful fancy. No wonder, then, that between its origins in a monastery and its spirit of revelry, the range of bottle sizes in which Champagne is stored and sold should have taken on delightful names, many of them Biblically inspired.
Yet, many people don’t know the meanings of these names. A knowledge of them can go a long way towards building Champagne connoisseurship, not to mention winning bar bets! Herewith the names and their meanings, the Champagne bottle volumes, and the related number of Champagne glasses pourable from each.
Champagne Bottle Names
- Piccolo: Italian for “small.” At 187.5 milliliters, the equivalent of 1 glass of Champagne.
- Demi: French for “half,” and also known affectionately as a Fillette, or “little girl.” At 375 milliliters, 2 glasses, the equivalent of half a bottle.
- Standard: Nothing playful about the regular 750-millileter bottle, yielding 8 glasses of Champagne.
- Magnum: Latin for “great,” this describes a bottle that, at 1.5 liters, is twice the standard size and yields 16 glasses.
- Jeroboam: The smallest of the more fancifully named Champagne bottle sizes, this one holds 3 liters, or 32 glasses. The name comes from the first king of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, who ruled for 22 years during the late 10th century BC. The name means “may the people grow numerous,” appropriate to the number of servings the bottle yields.
- Rehoboam: A 4.5-liter (48 glasses) bottle, named for the son of King Solomon and grandson of King David, who ruled the Kingdom of Judah in the 10th century BC. Appropriately for the bottle’s size, his name means “he who enlarges the people.”
- Methuselah: The oldest man mentioned in the Bible, who reputedly lived to be 969 years old and died around the time of the Great Flood that floated the Ark built by Noah, his descendant. The bottle named in Methuselah’s honor holds 6 liters of Champagne, or 64 glasses.
- Salmanazar: A variation on the name of five different Assyrian emperors who reigned between the 13th and 8th centuries BC, this bottle holds 9 liters, equivalent to 96 glasses.
- Balthazar: The name of the third Wise Man who followed the Star of Bethlehem to the Nativity means “god protect the king.” A Balthazar bottle holds 12 liters of Champagne, equal to 128 glasses.
- Nebuchadnezzar: The name of the greatest, most powerful of all Babylonian kings, who ruled from the late 7th to the middle 6th century BC. The bottle holds 15 liters, or 160 glasses.
- Melchior: The name of the first of the three Wise Men goes to the largest Champagne bottle, which holds 18 liters, or 192 glasses.
Giant bottles of Champagne add a special sense of celebration to life’s big events. Bear in mind, though, that some experts believe that the sparkling wine won’t be as good from larger bottles, losing some of its bubbles during the bottling process. And big bottles can be difficult to handle, with the average full Nebuchadnezzar weighing at a whopping 83.5 pounds.
Champagne bottles, especially big ones, should be opened with caution, as an unguarded cork can shoot out with great force, causing damage to property or persons. (Want to know more about Champagne? Learn how to open a Champagne bottle and how to make Champagne cocktails!)
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