Coffee & Tea
Pre 1000 AD
A berry that is ground up and mixed with animal fat is found to give an
energy boost. Coffee plants grow wild on hills above sea level in Ethiopia.
or
One version of the story or the origin of coffee, involves a goat herder
named Kaldi. he was from the land of Arabia Felix (Abyssinia). One night
when his goats didn't come home, he went looking and found them dancing
in abandoned glee near a shiny, dark-leaved shrub with red berries. Kaldi
started munching on the red berries. It wasn't long before he was dancing.
1000 AD
Arab traders bring coffee to Yemen (on the Arabian peninsula) and cultivate
the plant for the first time on plantations.
1453
Coffee is introduced to Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks. First Coffeehouse
is opened in 1475 "Kiva han."
1713
By the 16th Century, by means of coffeehouses in Mecca and Cairo, the spread
of coffee was rapid. Everywhere that people tasted coffee, they wanted
it. Coffee was available either from Mocha, the main port of Yemen, or
Java. Hence Mocha-Java. In those days, Mocha-Java symbolized "the
putting together in one drink, the entire possible world of coffee experience.
Now comes one of the most extraordinary stories in the spread of coffee,
the "saga of the noble tree." Louis XIV of France was an ardent
coffee drinker. The Dutch owed him a favor and managed, with great difficulty,
to procure him a coffee tree. The tree was obtained from the Arabian port
of Mocha, then carried to Java, and then back across the seas to Holland,
where it was brought overland to Paris. The first Greenhouse in Europe
was constructed to house "the noble tree." That was 1715.
It is the Dutch who deserve recognition for having fully appreciated the
aromatic and stimulant qualities of the new beverage, and for having realized
the possibility of its extensive cultivation in their colonies, so coffee
was introduccd into South and Central America, where it found a better habitat
than in its place of origin. Consequentlv, in a short time Brazil, Colombia,
and Mexico had the largest production, and still have today. From that single
tree, sprung billions of arabia trees, including those grown in Central
and South America.
In 1723, a French Naval officer, Gabriel Mathew de Cliev, stole
a seedling and transported it to Martinique. Within 50 years, an official
survey records 19 million coffee trees on Martinique. Eventually, 90% of
the world's coffee spreads from this plant.
Deamer 11/19/96