See below an outline on the history of tea. Research into this helped me understand why tea became such an integral part to some cultures in the world. Drinking tea appears to be as much a tradition as serving the basic human need of consuming beverages. The reason, why my English friends ascribe much more value to a good cup of tea than their German counterparts appears to be historic. Drinking tea, and especially the trade with tea has a longstanding tradition in the UK and is even interwoven with such big historical events as the American Revolutionary War.
From this, I understood that in order to help people like me to find their way to tea, one must to create some sort of way to allow them to access this rich culture and tradition sorrounding tea.
From this, I understood that in order to help people like me to find their way to tea, one must to create some sort of way to allow them to access this rich culture and tradition sorrounding tea.
A Brief History of Tea
- 2737 BC: Chinese emperor Shen Nung was sitting beneath a tree while his servant boiled drinking water, when some Camellia sinensis leaves blew into the water: the worlds second most popular drink was born
- 618-906 AD: Tea became established as the nation drink in China during the Tang dynasty, Japanese buddhist monks travelling through China introduced the beverage to Japan
- 1606: the first shipment of tea was shipped from China to the Netherlands via Java, Indonesia. Tea soon became a fashionable drink and status symbol among the European aristocracy
- 1658: tea was first advertised in London by a coffee house in Sweeting’s Rents in the City of London
- 1662: Catherine of Braganza, a notorious tea-addict, became the wife of Charles II and the Queen of England and introduced the Brits to the fashion craze from Europe
- 1664: the East India Trade Company placed its first order of 100lbs of tea to be shipped from Java to Britain
- 1689: with 25p per pound, the British government imposed such a high taxation that the trade of tea nearly stopped until the taxes were reduced to 5p per pound in 1692
- 1706: the first London Tea Auction took place
- late 18th century: the smuggling of tea became a massive business and subject to organised crime with 7m lbs of tea being sold illegally compared to 5m lbs of tea being soled legally
- 1773: to protest against tea duties, American unionist rallied the Boston Tea Party
- 1784: Prime Minister, William Pitt the Younger, slashed the tax from 119% to 12.5%, which stopped the illegal trading of tea
- 19th century: the British introduced tea to northern India to undermine China’s economic dominance in the market
- 1908: the American Thomas Sullivan invented the tea bag which became popularised in the 1920s in the USA and became popular in the UK after WWII
- 1940-1952: tea in the UK was rationed throughout WWII and the early post-war year
Source: UK Tea Council