CFRR- Along with water and tea, coffee is one of the three most popular beverages in the world, the history of coffee is not least interesting.
It can be said that almost all countries of the world consume coffee. In particular, European countries have the largest per capita consumption of coffee over the world (Statista, 2020). The coffee popularity is mainly due to the invigoration, excitement of the brain, the cause of this is produced by caffeine (C8H10N4O2), one kind of alkaloid found in coffee.
There are two main consumed varieties of coffee: coffea arabica and coffea canephora (the main variety is robusta). Arabica is noted to have a milder caffeine content with 0.9-1.3% compared with 1.51 to 3.33% for robusta per bean and its flavor is more aromatic than robusta (Temple and associates, 2017).
Most Popular Legend: Originated in Ethiopia
The first recorded wild coffee trees, probably from Kefa (Kaffa, Ethiopia). There are many theories about the origin of the coffee plant, in which the most popular legend is the discovery of coffee in 850 ADS, by an Arab shepherd named Kaldi. After watching the goats eat branches with white flowers and blue and red fruits, he discovered them ran and jumped tirelessly.
Kaldi and the goats discovered the coffee plant.
Photo: Caffelantico
No matter where coffee actually comes from, the stimulating effect it brings has certainly made it popular and widely spread. However, Islamic authorities claimed that the drink was intoxicating and brought excessive euphoric sensations, so it was banned.
Coffee is even thought to be the devil’s drink. However, many Muslims have been attracted to the drink made from coffee beans. However, many Muslims were attracted to the beverage made from coffee beans. Despite the risk of heavy fines, coffee drinking has spread rapidly among the Arabs and their neighbors, even setting the stage for the creation of a new social and cultural entity, the coffee shop.
In some areas of Kaffa and Sidamo, there has been a tradition of drinking coffee with diluted butter. They add buffalo butter cream to the brewed coffee to enhance the flavor and make it increase nutrition and soften the bitterness of the coffee (thespruceeats.com, 2021).
Around the 10th century, some indigenous Ethiopian tribes ate coffee mixed with liquid soup for breakfast and lunch. Gradually, the consumption of coffee decreased, and coffee beans became better known in creating for use as a drink. The coffee cherries are fermented by some tribes into an alcohol, while others have roasted, ground and boiled the beans into a decoction (thespruceeats.com, 2021).
The habit of making coffee became the most popular form and it spread to many other places. When it spread to the Muslim world in the 13th century, coffee was brewed stronger and darker, similar to one kind of herbal decoction. In this form, it is revered as a medicine and a means of prayer to give strength to people.
In the traditional Ethiopian coffee preparation, coffee beans are put in a large iron pan and roasted, then shredded or put in a pounding mortar. It is then mixed with sugar in a jar called jebena (a type of slender neck jar with straps), cooked and poured into a bowl (ucl.ac.uk)
As far as scientific assumptions
In his book All about coffee (1922), William H. Ukers argued that the authorities all agreed that the coffee tree was the native plant of
Abyssinia (the origin with Kingdom of Axum – the 1st to 8th century, 12th century with Kingdom of Zagwe, in the 13th century with the Kingdom of Abyssinia) and from the late of 20th century this transformed completely into the Ethiopian empire (worldhistory.org).
In the ninth century, an Arab doctor presented the use and property of coffee beans in terms of basic science. In addition, in the book Historia Ethiopica, Ludolphus (1681) pointed out that the Abyssinians (originated from Arabia) brought coffee plants to Ethiopia in the early period. The role of the Arabs must be recognized as the first spread the coffee plant, even though it was later discovered in Abassinia (Ethiopia) and from there brought to Yemen.
Another theory, some authorities believed that the first coffee cultivation in Yemen dated back to AD 575. At that time, the Persian invasion ended Ethiopian rule over Calebs who black people are conquered this country in 525 (William, 1922).
In his book All about coffee (1922), William H. Ukers argued that the authorities all agreed that the coffee tree was the native plant of
Abyssinia (the origin with Kingdom of Axum – the 1st to 8th century, 12th century with Kingdom of Zagwe, in the 13th century with the Kingdom of Abyssinia) and from the late of 20th century this transformed completely into the Ethiopian empire (worldhistory.org).
In the ninth century, an Arab doctor presented the use and property of coffee beans in terms of basic science. In addition, in the book Historia Ethiopica, Ludolphus (1681) pointed out that the Abyssinians (originated from Arabia) brought coffee plants to Ethiopia in the early period. The role of the Arabs must be recognized as the first spread the coffee plant, even though it was later discovered in Abassinia (Ethiopia) and from there brought to Yemen.
Another theory, some authorities believed that the first coffee cultivation in Yemen dated back to AD 575. At that time, the Persian invasion ended Ethiopian rule over Calebs who are black people conquered this country in 525 (William, 1922).
The period of the early modern history
In the 14th century, slave traders brought coffee from Ethiopia to Arab countries, and traded at the Mocha (Mokka) coffee trading center originated from name of the city Al Mukha (Yemen).
The city of Al Mukha (Yemen) around 18th century. Somali, Jewish and European areas are located outside the city.
Photo: Wikiwand
Although coffee drinks bring special uses, the growth of coffee plants is very slow; It was not until the 15th and 16th centuries that it flourished in the land of Yemen in the Arab world. In order to find a way to prevent the successful spread of the lucrative coffee beans, the Arabs for a long time sought to boil water or dry the beans so that they could not germinate when released from their borders.
According to Indian media, in 1600 (source of news said in 1695), Baba Budan, a Muslim pilgrim brought back coffee seeds and planted them near his hut at Chickmaglur in Mysore mountains, South India. They found descendant of the first coffee trees that grew under the canopy of centuries-old primeval trees. Most of the plants were grown by the natives of Kurg and Mysore and were believed to come from the picking seeds of the Baba Budan. Until 1840, the British considered starting to officially grow and export coffee in India. Plantations now extend from the northern part of Mysore to Tuticorin with the largest growing areas such as Karnataka, Kerala and Tamilnadu (All about coffee, (1922) and the Indian Department of Agriculture).
The journey to Europe
1517: Coffee appeared in Constantinople (Istanbul, Turkey)
Although coffee had been known in Constantinople (the capital of the Roman Empire (330–395), now Istanbul) since 1517, it was not until 1554 that residents became acquainted with the environment of the coffee shops. At that time, during the reign of The Great Soliman, a son of The First Selim, a Schemsi of Damascus, and Hekem of Aleppo opened the first two coffee shops in the neighborhood named Taktacalah
After that, Rauwolf, a well-known medical doctor and botanist in Augsburg, mentioned coffee as the first printed in chapter VIII of Rauwolf’s Travels, published in German at Frankfort and Lauingen in 1582–83.
1540: The Importance of Coffee in the Ottoman Empire (Turkey), coffee appeared in the Ottoman Empire around 1540, some historical documents record that coffee was introduced by Özdemir Pasha, the Ottoman governor of Yemen (dbpedia.org), who noticed the distinctive features of this drink. Ozdemir Pasha offered coffee to King Suleyman the Magnificent (reigned 1520 to 1566 (britannica.com) who liked the drink so much that the staff of Topkapi Palace decided to use a new method of brewing coffee. The era of King Suleyman was a real breakthrough for Turkish coffee history since coffee entered the Ottoman society of this era. The citizens of the Ottoman palace took the coffee beans, ground them and boiled them in a special pot, so that the new drink impressed Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and his wife Hurrem Sultan (dbpedia.org).
In 1544, two Syrian Arabs opened the first coffee shop in Istanbul, and at that time Sheikh Bostanzadeh Mehmed Effendi issued a message declaring that coffee was not forbidden but a useful drink (turkpidya.com).
A coffee shop in old Turkey. Photo: Turkpidya
1645: The first coffee shop opened in Venice, Italy
There is no specific timeline to determine the spread of coffee use from Constantinople to western parts of Europe; but it is more likely that Venetians, because of their proximity and strong trade with the Levant (a large geographical area conventionally located in Western Asia), were the first to become acquainted with it.
Prospero Alpini (Alpinus, 1553–1617), an erudite physician and botanist in Padua (now Padova), went to Egypt in 1580, and brought back the news of coffee. He was the first to print a description of the coffee plant and the drink in his treatise Trees of the Egyptians, written in Latin, and published in Venice, 1592.
In 1645, the first official “coffee shop” opened in Square San Marco, Venice. It was so successful that a century later the Venetian government was forced to suspend issuance of permits because there were more than two hundred the same shops in the town. This started the popularity of coffee in the region to increase markedly, and soon there were coffee shops in many Italian towns including Naples, Rome, Milan, Turin, Florence and Genoa.
1650: Oxford and 1652 London, United Kingdom
The first British coffee shop opened in Oxford in 1650. Two years later, a Greek servant named Pasqua Rosee brought the refreshing drink to London, opening a shop in St Michael’s Alley, Cornhill. . It was a success after only a short time and the others quickly copied and sold this addictive drink. In the past, men gathered in pubs to do business and exchange ideas. However, they are often annoying, noisy and – due to the availability of beer and wine – these places are not effective. On the other hand, coffee will prevent sleepiness with a suitable space for business discussion (history.co.uk)
1671: Paris, France
Although in 1944¸the traveler Pierre de La Roque was the first to introduce a few coffee beans to Marseille, it is officially recorded that coffee was first introduced in Paris in 1669 by Suleyman Aga, one ambassador of the Ottoman Empire during the reign of King Louis XIV of France. Aga was sent by Mohammed IV with bags of coffee.
He describes it as a miracle beverage when mixed with small amounts of cloves, cardamom seeds and sugar. Two years later, in 1671, an Armenian known as Pascal, opened a coffee mall at the St. Germain fair. He offers drinks from a tent, supplemented by the service of Turkish waiters who sell drinks in the crowd from small cups on trays (thegoodlifefrance.com)
1683: Vienna, Austria with the famous event that Austria won against Turkey, confiscated 500 bags of coffee as a trophy.
The history of Viennese cafe culture is closely linked with the end of the Siege of Vienna in 1683. The Austrians successfully repelled the invaders Turkish and obtained bags of coffee beans.
According to the legendLegend has it that, a Viennese citizen Georg Franz Kolschitzky (1640 – 1694) was the first to obtain a license to serve coffee in the city after his heroic actions during the siege of Vienna. A street in Vienna’s 4th arrondissement is named after him and a statue is placed on the corner of Favoritenstraße / Kolschitzkygasse.
However, the first cafe in Vienna was actually opened by an Armenian spy named Johannes-Diodato-Park in Wieden, district 4 in Vienna. He served at the Vienna Imperial court and was a man full of secrets with the secret of making coffee from his homeland (wien.gv.at).
1673: In Germany
Coffee was introduced to Germany around 1670. This drink appeared at the court of the Brandenburg electorate in 1675. Northern Germany first appeared coffee from London, an English merchant who opened the first coffee shop in Hamburg in 1679–80, the next is Regensburg in 1689; Leipsic in1694; Nuremberg in 1696; Stuttgart in 1712; Augsburg in 1713; and Berlin in 1721. (William, 1922).
New World
- 1773: Coffee is as much a part of American culture as blue jeans and rock-n-roll music. Coffee was finally brought to the New World by the British in the mid-17th century. Coffee shops were popular, but it was not until the Boston Party of 1773 that America’s coffee culture was changed forever: the revolt against King George III created a mass shift from tea to coffee among the colonists (theculturetrip.com).
- 1882: The first Espresso machine was invented in France by Louis Bernard Rabaut, although this was only a very simple design, it marked the birth by a unique brewing method. Until 1901, Luigi Bezzera (a mechanic) in Italy patented the first commercial espresso machine, titled “Innovations in machinery for preparation and instant service coffee”.
The drawing of an espresso machine by Angelo Moriondo, 1884
Photo: Wikipedia
- 1850: A French Catholic brought coffee to Vietnam and was first planted in the church grounds in 1857. From there, coffee began to grow in the country that ranks second in the world in terms of export volume for coffee.
The development of cappuccino
Cappuchino coffees gradually conquered the whole world. This is a revolution of coffee all over the world. Its father was a priest, Father Marco d’Aviano of the Minor Capuchin Priory.
From September 1683, this monk came to Vienna and asked to correct the taste of the coffee and add milk because it was too dark at first, while the color of the monks’ robes closely resembled the brown of a perfect cup cappuccino. Since then the name cappuchino was given to the type of drink mixed with coffee and milk to reduce the strength of pure coffee. (Wikipedia.com).
Cappucino coffee. Photo: Huy Phạm – CFRR
Plantations around the world
As demand for the beverage continues to spread, there has been stiff competition for coffee growing outside of Arabia. The Dutch finally had seedlings in the second half of the 17th century. They failed in their first attempt to plant them in India, but they succeeded in experimenting in Batavia, on the island of Java, which is now Indonesia, this is also a famous place for coffee in Asia. These trees thrived and it wasn’t long before the Dutch had a thriving and productive coffee trade. Later, they expanded the cultivation of coffee trees to the islands of Sumatra and Celebes.
To Americas
In 1714, the Mayor of Amsterdam gave a gift of a young coffee tree to King Louis XIV of France. The king ordered it to be planted in the Royal Botanical Garden in Paris. In 1723, a young naval officer, Gabriel de Clieu, obtained a seedling from the King’s tree. Despite a challenging journey – inclement weather, a vandal trying to destroy the seedling, and a pirate attack – he transported safely it to Martinique (the island of France located in the Lesser Antilles in east of the Caribbean) .
After being planted, the seedlings not only thrived but are noted to have been replicated to over 18 million coffee trees on the island of Martinique over the next 50 years. What is even more amazing is that this seedling is all coffee trees throughout the Caribbean, South and Central America.
Coffee is believed to have arrived in Brazil in 1727 from Guiana in French through a Portuguese Lieutenant Colonel named Francisco del Melo Palheta. He persuaded the wife of the governor of Guianase to ask her to help smuggle the beans across the border and succeeded, then beans began in the country that later ranked first in the world in terms of export volume.
Workers harvest coffee beans at a farm in Alfenas, Minas Gerais state, Brazil.
Photo: Victor Moriyama – Bloomberg
At first, Brazilian coffee was mainly consumed by local European colonists. However, as demand increased in Europe and the United States, exports began to increase. This increased demand and by 1820 Brazil was producing 30% of the world’s coffee. Since then, coffee cultivation has spread to other countries such as Guatemala, Mexico, Panama…
In the mid to late 1800s, epidemics devastated Asia’s coffee industry, giving Central and South America a great opportunity to become the center of coffee production in the world. By the 1910s, Brazil was growing 80% of the world’s coffee. By the end of the 18th century, coffee had become one of the world’s most profitable export crops. As other manufacturing nations slowly recovered, that percentage dropped again, but the country has never lost its position as the world’s largest producer. At that time, after crude oil, coffee was the most sought-after commodity in the world. (kessays.com)
Reference:
- https://dbpedia.org/page/%C3%96zdemir_Pasha
- https://www.statista.com/chart/8602/top-coffee-drinking-nations/.
- https://www.thespruceeats.com/the-origin-of-coffee-765180
- http://www.cafesrichard.com/france-in-the-history-of-coffee-101.html
- https://coffee3f.com/blogs/cafe-news/lich-su-cua-cay-ca-phe
- https://espressocoffeeguide.com/all-about-coffee-2/worlds-best-history-of-coffee/coffee-history-1600-1650/
- https://turkpidya.com/en/the-history-of-turkish-coffee/ )
- https://theculturetrip.com/north-america/usa/articles/a-brief-history-of-american-coffee-culture/
- https://thegoodlifefrance.com/the-history-of-coffee-in-france/
- https://vi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cà_phê
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Suleyman-the-Magnificent,
- https://www.history.co.uk/history-of-london/londons-coffee-houses#:~:text=Britain’s%20first%20coffee%20shop%20opened,others%20were%20quick%20to%20copy.
- https://www.kessays.com/essays/international-studies/history-of-coffee-in-latin-america.php
- https://www.ucl.ac.uk/atlas/tigrinya/coffee_ceremony.html
- https://www.wien.gv.at/english/culture-history/viennese-coffee-culture.html
- https://www.worldhistory.org/Kingdom_of_Abyssinia/
- Ramalho, J. C. (2002). O cafeeiro. Aspectos gerais da sua biologia e cultura. Comunicaçõ es, nº 21, Instituto de Investigação Científica Tropical, Lisboa, p. 44 [in Portuguese].
- Temple, J. L, Bernard, C, Lipshultz, S. E, Czachor, J. D, Westphal, J. A, Mestre, M. A. (2017). The Safety of Ingested Caffeine: A Comprehensive Review. Frontiers in Psychiatry 2017, 8.
- Ukers, W. H. (1922). All about coffee. New York: The Tea and Coffee Trade Journal Company.
