Libournais

West of Libourne, where the Isle meets the Dordogne, Fronsac covers six communes and a few plots of Galgon, on a landscape of slopes and rocky promontories, the "tertres", the highest of which, the Tertre de Fronsac, rises to 76 metres. Recognised in 1937 as "Côtes de Fronsac", its wines have carried the name Fronsac since 1976. Only the limestone plateaus and molasse slopes are delimited, the low alluvial land along both rivers being excluded; the appellation makes red wine only, led by Merlot. Its neighbour Canon-Fronsac is a separate appellation.

A Right Bank appellation recognised in 1936, Pomerol covers the commune of that name and the north of Libourne, between Saint-Émilion to the south-east and Lalande-de-Pomerol, from which the Barbanne stream divides it. On an almost flat plateau of gravel and sand terraces laid down by the Isle over clay, it makes only reds, with Merlot by far the majority grape: deeply coloured, broad and long wines with black-fruit aromas, sometimes violet and truffle. Pomerol has no official classification of its estates.

The Right Bank's flagship appellation, Saint-Émilion spans nine communes around the medieval town inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1999 — the first such recognition ever given to a wine-growing landscape. On a limestone plateau and hillsides overlooking the Dordogne valley, Merlot and Cabernet Franc give reds that differ, even within the appellation, depending on whether they come from the limestone plateau, the clay-limestone footslopes or the gravel terraces bordering Pomerol. Wines meeting stricter yield and selection criteria may claim the separate "Saint-Émilion grand cru" appellation, under which the Premiers Grands Crus Classés and Grands Crus Classés have been ranked since 1955, in a classification revised roughly every ten years.