Designation for the flat and bulbous bottle shape (in brown or green colour) in the German Franconian growing region. It has been used here for at least 250 years, the Bürgerspital in Würzburg is considered the "birthplace". This is intended to give Franconian wine an unmistakable identity and to protect it from forgery. According to a Würzburg document from 1728, it is intended to "control any trade abuses". The name is derived either from "bauchige Buddel" or from "Booksbüdel" (a bag used in former times for the prayer book). According to a nice anecdote, some Benedictine nuns who were involved in viticulture are said to have obtained bottles that fit exactly into their prayer book bags. In this way they could, "withdrawn to prayer", unsuspectingly strengthen themselves with the divine drink.
After the most frequently quoted variant, the name is derived from the scrotum of the billy goat. The local historian Johann Baptist Sartorius, born in Würzburg, explained in his work "Die Mundart der Stadt Würzburg" ("The Dialect of the City of Würzburg"), published in 1862, what a goat's pouch is, namely "a pressed, round bottle, shaped in the manner of the goat's pouch or scrotum, for filling and sending the rock wine". A further indication of this is that in the Middle Ages, canteens were made from the kidskin of the testicles, in which the Landser carried their wine (or schnapps). This is shown in a drawing by Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528).
The volume of a Bocksbeutel bottle is usually the conventional quality wine bottle size of 0.75 litres. However, there are also some with 0.25 litres, as well as in the magnum size of 1.5 and double magnum size of 3 litres. In the Franconian wine growing region, the proportion of Bocksbeutel bottles is over 40% of the wines, and a wine route is named after it there. According to German wine law, the protected Bocksbeutel bottle may only be used in precisely geographically defined areas exclusively for quality wines and Prädikat wines (not for wine or country wine). This is the entire Franconian wine growing region, as well as the Tauberfranken area in the Baden wine growing region and the four municipalities of Neuweier, Steinbach, Umweg and Varnhalt in the Ortenau area.
Bottles similar to Bocksbeute are also used in Greece for the Agioritikos as well as on the islands of Kefallonia and Paros, in France for the Armagnac, for the rosé wine Mateus in Portugal (here called Cantil), for some DOC wines from South Tyrol (Bozner Leiten, Eisacktaler, St. Magdalener, Südtiroler, Terlaner), for the Moscato from Trentino, for the Greco di Bianco (Calabria), and from the Undurraga winery in Chile. There are also special Bocksbeutel coolers manufactured in the appropriate form. The biggest disadvantage is the poor storage/storage possibility. See listings under bottles and wine containers.