4 February 2008 by Shifrah Combiths
Coffee Myths and Fun Facts
Coffee’s discovery and propagation has a history wonderfully laced with mystery and intrigue. From frisky mountain animals to banishment and smuggling, there’s literally a world of myths and interesting facts behind the coffee that’s so easily available to us today.
One of the most popular tales of coffee’s discovery goes something like this: An Ethiopian goat-herder named Khaldi who loved poetry and playing music on his pipe was distraught one day when his flock failed to return to him at dusk. After an anxious search, he discovered them frolicking in a clearing, more active than he’d ever seen them. Butting each other playfully and bleating in excitement, the goats mystified Khaldi until he noticed that they were feasting on some shiny small round berries. He sidled over to the plant and tried some himself. He was never tired again. Neither were the monks he shared his secret with – they used coffee to stay awake for hours upon hours of prayer.
A more accurate rendition may go something like this: An Ethiopian tribe that made protein-rich snacks from coffee berries mixed with animal fat eventually noticed that the concoction gave them an unusual energy boost.
No-one knows for sure, but it is generally believed that near 1000 A.D. traders brought coffee to Arabia, where two important developments took place – they began to cultivate coffee plants on plantations and they began to boil the beans.
From here, coffee’s adventures were nothing if not filled with excitement. Initially spreading alongside Islam, coffee eventually managed to spread across the globe, but not without obstacles. More than once, people tried to have coffee banned. This happened both in Mecca and then in Italy a hundred years later. Both times, the proposal was drastically overturned. Mecca’s sultan not only ordered the governor who suggested the ban executed, he also declared coffee sacred. In a similar twist, the Pope decided to try the disputed beverage himself before he disallowed it. He loved it, and ended up giving it his full endorsement, pronouncing it an acceptable Christian drink.
Getting coffee across borders was a story in itself. It’s said that no coffee seed sprouted outside of Africa or Arabia until well into the seventeenth century when fertile seeds were smuggled into Europe. Growers had made exported beans infertile by cooking them before they left the country. Java, a Dutch colony now a part of Indonesia, saw the first European coffee estate. Coffee plants were esteemed gifts that the Dutch bestowed on other countries. They presented a coffee plant to the French king, who grew it in the royal gardens.
Coffee made its way to Latin America when a young French naval officer snuck in to the gardens, snipped a clipping of the prized plant, and brought it on a perilous voyage back to French Martinique, where it thrived under armed protection.
Brazil began its coffee industry when an officer was sent to settle a border dispute between the French and Dutch colonies. The French governor’s wife bid farewell to the Brazilian officer with a bouquet in which she’d hidden the cuttings of a coffee plant.
History has shaped coffee’s prominence. America’s Boston Tea Party helped elevate coffee from a favorite drink to a patriotic beverage. America added vacuum-packed tins of roasted coffee and the invention of soluble instant coffee to coffee’s repertoire.
Throughout history, coffee has instigated volatile and inventive behavior. Although things seem to have settled down, it’s hard to help thinking that some of coffee history’s spark has made its way into our now-calm cups.