One wet and cold afternoon, while I was waiting for my next batch of work to come in (I'm a home typist Home Working: The Virtual Life), I made myself a lovely strong, steamy cup of tea, settled back down in front of my computer and, with dunky biscuit in hand, decided to do a bit of delving into the history of my favourite afternoon brew.
According to legend, tea was discovered in China around 2740 BC. The evidence is a bit wishy-washy as to how it all came about but the general consensus of opinion would seem to indicate that a Chinese emperor was sitting under a tree when some leaves from the tree fell into a pot of water he was boiling. He found that the resulting drink cleared his mind and left him with such a feeling of calm that he named it “Tai” meaning “peace” in Chinese. By 600-900 AD tea had become the national drink of China and, during the 8th century a Chinese writer produced a book entirely about tea (called Ch'a Ching - Tea Classic). Shortly after that, Japanese Buddhist monks who'd travelled to China to study, returned to their native country, carrying with them a supply of tea.
From Japan, tea was traded along the Persian caravan routes. The first evidence of tea drinking in Europe doesn't come until the 16th century when mention is made that Portuguese missionaries and traders working in the East drank it, but it was the Dutch it seems who had the foresight to import it commercially from the late 16th century. In the early part of the 17th century they had set up a trading post on Java and via Java, the first consignment was shipped from China to Holland.
However, the ever cautious Brits were a little less keen to give it a whirl. At the turn of the 17th century, the British East India Company had a monopoly on imported goods outside Europe and it seems more than likely that the initial introduction of tea to England was made by the East India sailors who brought in small amounts. The first evidence that we have of tea becoming popular was an advert in a London newspaper - Mercurius Politicus - from September 1658 which announced that "Tcha" (sometimes called "Tay") was on sale at a coffee house in "Sweetings Rents" in London which indicated that coffee was introduced to England prior to tea.
However, it was Queen Catherine of Braganza who started the ball rolling - or should I say the tea brewing. The Portuguese princess had married Charles II in 1662 and it was understood she enjoyed partaking of a daily cuppa. Needless to say, as per usual with the Brits who like to keep up with the Joneses, this immediately set a trend for the aristocracy of England. The canny East India Company then began importing tea big time into Britain from China via Java, the first major order being in 1664 for 100 lbs of it. By 1678 4,713 lbs was imported and by 1685 12,070 lbs was imported which swamped the market. By 1750 tea had become so popular amongst us Brits, particularly in the coffee houses that East India's imports had reached an incredible 4,727,992 lbs!
Tea, however, remained predominantly a middle to upper class domain as it was so expensive, partially due to high taxation. The first tax on tea was introduced in 1689 and that encouraged smuggling to take a grip - it began on a small scale but by the late 18th century it was estimated that up to 7 million lbs of tea was being imported somewhat nefariously, compared to 5 million lbs imported by legal means. Taxation also encouraged smugglers and traders to adulterate the tea by leaves from other plants, or "second-hand" tea leaves. Unfortunately this sometimes left the tea with an odd hue, so other odd ingredients were added - anything from animal dung to copper carbonate!!
By 1784 the government decided that the high tax was more trouble than it was worth so William Pitt the Younger slashed tax and the whole nation jumped for joy!! But there was a new debate on the horizon - was tea good for you? It was a concern amongst the upper classes that, now tea was readily affordable, their staff may imbibe and it may lead to weakness and possibly depression. The debate continued into the 19th century but was basically laid to rest in the mid 19th century when it was considered that the side effects of tea were far preferable to those of alcohol amongst the working classes and this thinking was largely assisted by the temperance movement who offered tea at their meetings in place of alcohol.
By 1834 the East India Company ended their trade monopoly with China. As the name suggests, India had been the primary base for the East India Company and this led to India increasing its cultivation of tea. By 1839 the quality and quantity of the tea grown in Assam was enough to enable the first auction of Assam tea in Britain and by 1888 the tea imports from India outstripped those from China. Due to the cheaper imported tea from India and Sri Lanka rather than China, by 1901 the consumption of tea per head had increased to over 6 lbs from just 2 lbs in 1851 and so it was established as the great British beverage and it's remained so to this day!
So basically, I now know tea became popular in England after coffee … but when was coffee introduced? And as for chocolate?? … I can feel another couple of articles coming on!
