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There is much controversy
over the origins and history of coffee. The beginnings of coffee have
been traced to specific people and places in particular times, but none
that can definitely lay claim to having "discovered" coffee. Many books
have been written chronicling the origins of coffee with all the drama,
romance, and mythology reserved for only the great discoveries in
history. The most popular story about the discovery of coffee beans is
the legend of the dancing goats from before 800 A.D.
Kali, a goatherd in Arabia, found his goats dancing
near a shrub with dark shiny leaves and bright red berries. These
berries found their way to the local monastery, where experimentation
led to the use of coffee by monks, which allowed for livelier evening
prayers. According to this story coffee was spread from monastery to
monastery until everyone was drinking coffee. In the 16th century coffee
was supposedly condemned by the followers of Mohammed, who complained
that coffee threatened their religion by luring people from the mosques
in favor of coffeehouses.
The spread of coffee was quite remarkable, as
biological evidence suggests that coffee originated in Ethiopia, where
it still grows wild. African cultures ate coffee beans as a food or
chewed them to extract the caffeine. Coffee then spread to Arabia, with
one theory being that the Ethiopian invasion and rule of Yemen in 525
A.D. allowed a fifty-year window of opportunity for Coffea arabica to be
introduced from Africa. From this time on, it has been cultivated in
Yemen.
Legend has it that despite fervent protection of their
discovery, the Arabs could not prevent fertile beans from being smuggled
out of their country. A Moslim pilgrim in the 17th century is thought to
have smuggled seven seeds back to southern India, where he planted them
and they flourished. India still produces excellent coffee, and the
particular area where this pilgrim supposedly planted them produces a
particular variety of coffee, var. Old Chick, and more than one third of
India's coffee.
The French King Louis XIV managed to procure from the
Dutch a coffee tree which had originated in Mocha, been taken to Java,
then to Holland and finally to Paris. This prized possession of the king
brought to fruition the construction of the first greenhouse in Europe
in the early 18th century. From this very plant came most of the coffee
presently growing in Latin America.
More than one variety sprang from this plant of the French
and surprisingly within only a few years. Martinique and consequently
Mexico, Haiti, and the Caribbean established cultivation of one variety
from this plant, while var. Bourbon was cultivated from the king's plant
on Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean, then known as the Isle of
Bourbon. The Brazilian Santos coffees and the Oaxacan coffees of Mexico
are said to be descended from this variety from Reunion Island.
Yet another oddity is the procurement of shoots and seeds
from the French for Brazil, through dastardly deeds by way of the wife
of the governor of French Guinea. The last notable move of the plant was
in the late 19th century, when Brazilian coffee seeds were introduced in
Kenya and Tanzania, ironically within hundreds of miles of coffee's
origin.
The level of connoiseurship that exists today is a far
more recent phenomenon than the history of coffee consumption may imply.
The early drinkers of coffee sweetened and spiced their coffee,
presumably because many recipes from this time required boiling the
grounds for more than a half hour. As any coffee-lover would know, the
delicate balance of a delectable cup of coffee would not have survived
such preparation. For this reason Europeans heavily sugared and creamed
their coffee, and in East Africa and the Middle East coffee absorbed
quantities of sweet and spice, such as cardamom, prior to libation.
The connoisseurship of coffee has reached a level in
the late 20th century never before experienced. This is because the
population of the United States has grown substantially, and the
intellectual inquiry which results from America's insatiable appetite
for quality coffee has established a new niche. This niche allows for
the resurgence of the small coffee farm, which employs traditional
practices and a level of artisanship that cannot be recreated otherwise.
The U.S. market for specialty varieties of small, farm-grown coffees
has, luckily for coffee-lovers, grown such that these sources of coffee
are well supported and can thrive.
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