Encyclopedia: History of Coffee
The history of coffee dates back to the 9th century. The origins of coffee stem from Ethiopia in northern Africa. From there, the beans moved into the Arab world and were brought into mass cultivation there. When the Muslim world and Europe began to actively trade with each other, the popularity of the coffee beverage spread.
Etymology
The word entered English in 1598 via Italian caffé, via Turkish kahve, via Arabic qahwa, a word of uncertain etymology meaning "wine" as well as "coffee". There are several legendary accounts of the origin of the drink (see below). One possible actual origin is the Kaffa region in Ethiopia, where the coffee plant originated (its name there is bunn or bunna).
Origins in Ethiopia
The coffee tree Coffea arabica is a flowering evergreen shrub indigenous to Ethiopia in northeast Africa. Its related species C. liberica and C. robusta were discovered growing wild in other regions of Africa.
One legendary account of the discovery of coffee involves the Yemenite Sufi mystic Shaikh ash-Shadhili. When traveling in Ethiopia he observed goats of unusual vitality and, upon trying the berries that the goats had been eating, experienced the same vitality. A similar myth attributes the discovery of coffee to an Ethiopian goatherder named Kaldi.
In Ethiopia, coffee beans were initially simply eaten, not widely brewed as a drink. Coffee beans were consumed by monks to help them stay awake during prayers.
Coffee in the Arab world
Coffee beans were first exported from Ethiopia to Yemen. Yemeni traders brought coffee back to their homeland and began to cultivate the bean.
The earliest mention of coffee may be a reference to Bunchum in the works of the 9th century CE physician Razi, but more definite information on the preparation of a beverage from the roasted coffee berries dates from several centuries later.
The most important of the early writers on coffee was Abd al-Qadir al-Jaziri, who in 1587 compiled a work tracing the history and legal controversies of coffee entitled "Umdat al safwa fi hill al-qahwa". He reported that one Sheikh, Jamal-al-Din al-Dhabhani, mufti of Aden, was the first to adopt the use of coffee (circa 1454). Coffee's usefulness in driving away sleep made it popular among Sufis. Al-Jaziri's manuscript work is of considerable interest with regards to the history of coffee in Europe as well. A copy reached the French royal library, where it was translated in part by Antoine Galland as De l'origine et du progrés du Cafe. The translation traces the spread of coffee from Arabia Felix (the present day Yemen) northward to Mecca and Medina, and then to the larger cities of Cairo, Damascus, Baghdad, and Istanbul.
The 19th-century orientalist Antoine Isaac Silvestre de Sacy edited the first two chapters of al-Jaziri's manuscript and included it in the second edition of his Chrestomathie Arabe (Paris, 1826, 3 vols.). Galland's 1699 work was recently reissued (Paris: Editions La Bibliothque, 1992).
Consumption of coffee was outlawed in Mecca in 1511, and in Cairo in 1532, but in the face of the drink's immense popularity, the decrees were later rescinded. In 1554, the first coffeehouse in Istanbul opened.
Coffee in Europe
Coffee was first imported to Europe to Italy, according to historic sources. The vibrant trade between the Italian city of Venice and the Muslims in North Africa, Egypt, and the East brought a large variety of African goods, including coffee, to this leading European port. Venetian merchants decided to introduce coffee to the wealthy in Venice, charging them heavily for the beverage. In this way, coffee was introduced to Europe.
Coffee in England
Largely through the efforts of the British East India Company and the Dutch East India Company, coffee became available in England no later than the 16th century, according to Leonhard Rauwolf's 1583 account. The first coffeehouse in England was opened and operated in Oxford by a man named either Jacob or Jacobs, a Turkish Jew, in 1650. The first coffeehouse in London was opened two years later in St. Michael's Alley in Cornhill. The proprietor was Pasqua Rosée, the servant of Daniel Edwards, a trader in Turkish goods. Edwards imported the coffee and assisted Rosée in setting up the establishment. The popularity of coffeehouses spread rapidly in Europe, and later America. By 1675, there were more than 3,000 coffeehouses in England.
Women were not allowed in coffeehouses, and in London, the anonymous 1674 "Women's Petition Against Coffee" declared:
...the Excessive Use of that Newfangled, Abominable, Heathenish Liquor called COFFEE [...] has [...] Eunucht our Husbands, and Crippled our more kind Gallants, that they are become as Impotent, as Age.
Coffee in France
Antoine Galland (1646-1715) in his aforementioned translation described the Muslim association with coffee, tea and chocolate: "We are indebted to these great [Arab] physicians for introducing coffee to the modern world through their writings, as well as sugar, tea, and chocolate." Galland reported that he was informed by Mr. de la Croix, the interpreter of King Louis XIV of France, that coffee was brought to Paris by a certain Mr. Thevenot, who had travelled through the East. On his return to that city in 1657, Thevenot gave some of the beans to his friends, one of whom was de la Croix. However, the major spread of the popularity of this beverage in Paris was soon to come. In 1669, Soleiman Agha, Ambassador from Sultan Muhammed IV, arrived in Paris with his entourage, bringing with him a large quantity of coffee beans. Not only did they provide their French and European guests with coffee to drink, but they also donated some beans to the royal court. Between July 1669 and May 1670, the Ambassador managed to firmly establish the custom of drinking coffee among Parisians.
Coffee in Austria and Poland
The first coffeehouse in Austria opened in Vienna in 1683 after the Battle of Vienna, using supplies from the spoils obtained after defeating the Turks. The officer who received the coffee beans, Polish military officer Franciszek Jerzy Kulczycki, opened the coffee house and helped popularize the custom of adding sugar and milk to the coffee. Until recently, this was celebrated in Viennese coffeehouses by hanging a picture of Kulczycki in the window. The first coffeehouses in Poland were opened in Krakow in the 16th or 17th century because of their close trade ties with the East, most notably the Turks.
Coffee in the rest of the world
The introduction of coffee to the Americas is attributed to France through its colonisation of many parts of the continent, starting with the Martinique and the colonies of the West Indies where the first French coffee plantations were founded. The first coffee plantation in Brazil occured in 1727 when Lt. Col. Francisco de Melo Palheta smuggled seeds from the French Guiana. By the 1800's, Brazil's harvests would turn coffee from an elite indulgence to a drink for the masses. Brazil, which like most other countries cultivates coffee as a commercial commodity, relied heavily on slave labor from Africa for the viability of the plantations until the abolition of slavery in 1888. The success of coffee in 17th-century Europe was paralleled with the spread of the habit of tobacco smoking all over the continent during the course of the Thirty Years' War (1618-48).
For many decades in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Brazil was the biggest producer of coffee and a virtual monopolist in the trade. However, a policy of maintaining high prices soon opened opportunities to other nations, such as Colombia, Guatemala and Indonesia.
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