Do you know that tea we usually have in a daily life has deep history?
It would have never been imagined RTD tea as we have today when Japanese tea manufacture was started.
It makes it possible to have tea with more gratefully if you know the tea history.
The origin of tea of 5000 years ago
The first human being who had tea is the Emperor Shen Nung in legend in China in 2800 BCE, around 5000 years ago. The Emperor Shen Nung is said to have eaten plants in practice to discover medical or edible plants. There is an anecdote that he was poisoned by 72 kinds of poisons in a day and he chewed tea leaves to remove poison.
The world’s oldest book about tea “Classic of Tea” was written by Lu Yu in 760 in Tang era. The book has a content that it was the Emperor Shen Nung who started tea drink. It is thought that tea had been already spread in China at that time because the book has not only the ways of manufacturing or drinking tea but details about producing areas or tea utensils.
Tea came to Japan 1200 years ago
Tea history in Japan started in the early 10th century, 1200 years ago. A history book “Nihon Koki (Later chronicle in Japan)” has a record of the first drinking tea in Japan. In the book, it is written that a monk Eichu decocted and offered tea to the Emperor Saga on April 22nd in 815 and it shows that tea in Japan has a long history.
Eichu had been in Tang for almost 30 years and monks Saicho and Kukai are also thought to have learned in Tang with envoys to Tang Dynasty in the same era. We can guess that envoys to Tang Dynasty or monks learned in Tang brought tea to Japan from these records.
Tea spread to ordinary homes in the 17th – 19th century
Tea was regarded as a rare value drink that mainly monks at temples drank when it came to Japan.
In the 13th century, Eisai, the founder of Rinzaishu that is one of the major sects of Buddhism, learned the way to drink tea (Matcha style) in Song. It is said that it was the beginning of the spreading of tea that he sowed the tea seeds brought back to Japan. Eisai wrote the first tea book in Japan “Drinking tea for health” in 1211.
“Tocha (Tea fight)”, betting on guessing producing areas of each tea was popular during the time, and Ashikaga Takauji, a general at that time, issued a prohibition of it.
In the 14th -16th century, the Ashikaga government mediated to build tea gardens in Uji and that made Ujicha spread.
That was in the 17th -19th century when tea was spread to ordinary homes. Nagatani Soen, called the founder of Sencha, developed an original manufacturing method “Sencha of Nagatani style (the Uji style of manufacture) and the fine tea manufactured by the method was superior in its unique taste and flavor.