Huge wine press, Saint-Gengoux-de-Scissé (71), Saône-et-Loire (71)

This huge scale wine press (pressoir à grand point) dates from 1869 and is on outside display in Saint-Gengoux-de-Scissé: an example of the vine-growing tradition in the village. The municipality acquired it in 1965 and it originally belonged to a family in the hamlet of La Verzée in the same commune. The story is that originally a team of oxen carried a whole oak tree from the forest of Saint-Maurice-de-Satonnay and that it was then sculpted. Regional historian Émile Violet has described the mechanism as 'a very large nut cracker'. The machine was working until 1926 and later dismantled piece by piece to be displayed here.