Tea has been the world’s favourite beverage for more than 5,000 years. Across five millennia – from the FIRST accident to the FIRST advertisement, from the FIRST blend to the FIRST book and from the FIRST reference to the FIRST recipe, tea’s journey has been as enduring as it has been enticing.

We revisit tea’s incredible journey – its unexpected twists and unintended turns. We retell tea’s most memorable moments, milestones and mileposts. We revel at how this most wonderful of brews continues its timeless appeal and allure even today. 

Steep yourself a cup of Oolong or Earl Grey, Masala Chai or Muscatel Darjeeling…and join us as go Tea FIRST…Tea FIRSTs

The Early Years in China

• 2737 BC : According to one legend, Chinese emperor Shen Nung was sitting beneath a tree while his servant was boiling some water for drinking.  Some leaves accidentally dropped in the water. Shen Nung, a renowned herbalist, decided to try the brew his servant had accidentally created. It had a very pleasing flavour and a soothing taste. The tree was Camellia Sinensis, and the drink is what we now call TEA!
• 206 BC : 220 AD : FIRST known containers of tea found in tombs dating back to the Hun dynasty
• 350 AD :  FIRST time tea is mention of tea in a Chinese dictionary mentions as Erh Ya
• Tang Dynasty (618 – 906 AD) : FIRST instance of tea became being established as China’s national drink

• 725 AD :  Chinese give tea its own character  ch’a 茶
• 760 – 762 AD : Cha’ Ching (The Tea Classic) – the FIRST book on tea was written by Tao Lu Yu 
• 780 AD : the FIRST tax on tea is imposed in China
• 805 AD : FIRST time tea travel to Japan with monks who came to China to study Buddhism, introduced Tea to Japan.
• Late 15^th century : the Japanese Tea Ceremony emerges. With its roots in the Cha’Ching and called Cha-no’yu, it literally means “hot water tea”

Tea comes to the West

• 1560 : Father Jasper de Cruz, a Portuguese Jesuit, FIRST introduce tea to Europe 
• 1598 : the Dutch traveller Jan Hugo van Lin-schooten, noted in a book about his adventures that the Indians ate the leaves as a vegetable with garlic and oil and boiled the leaves to make a brew. He called the beverage CHAA.
• It was the Dutch who FIRST  shipped a commercial lot of tea to Europe, in late 16^th century
• 1657 : The FIRST sale of tea in Britain was done by the East India Company as it undercut the Dutch prices. 
• 1658 : The republican newspaper Mercurius Politicus carries the FIRST advert for tea in the British isles, announcing “That Excellent, and by all Physicians approved, China drink, called by the Chinese, Tcha, by other nations Tay alias Tee, …sold at the Sultaness-head, ye Cophee-house in Sweetings-Rents, by the Royal Exchange, London”. Teas was advertised as a panacea for apoplexy, catarrh, colic, consumption, drowsiness, epilepsy, gallstones, lethargy, migraine, paralysis, and vertigo!
• 1661 : Queen Catherine of  Braganza married Charles II, comes to England and makes tea fashionable in the courtly and aristocratic circles in Britain
• 1664 : The FIRST shipment of Tea to by the East India Company who placed an order for 100 lbs of China Tea to be shipped from Java into Britain
• The FIRST TAX on TEA was introduced in Britain in 1689 – 25p per lb! It was so high that it almost stopped tea sales
• 1679 : The FIRST tea was sold in London Tea Auction. Auctions were then held on a quarterly basis and teas were “sold by candle”- the time taken for each tea to be sold was 1 inch of the burning candle!
• 1707 : Tea is FIRST served by Thomas Twining at Tom’s Coffee House in London – the FIRST tea room in the world!
• 1717 : Tom’s Coffee House evolves into Golden Lyon – the FIRST teashop in the world
• In 1834, the London Auctions shifted to Mincing Lane, and in a few years, all merchants establishments had their offices in Mincing Lane, and it came to be known as the “ Street of Tea”. (The grand tradition of London Tea Auction ended on 29^th June, 1998).

Tea starts in India

• 1823-1831 : Robert Bruce was told by a local trader in Assam – Maniram Bora, about a native variety of tea plant growing in the present day state of Assam in India. Robert Bruce died in the Indo-Burmese war, but had fortunately confided about native tea plants growing in Assam to his brother, Charles
• 1837 : The FIRST tea plantation was started in Assam using the native Assam bushes (named Camellia Sinensis Assamica) at Chabua in Upper Assam
• 1838 : The FIRST twelve chests of manufactured tea from indigenous Assam leaf were shipped to London and sold at the London Tea Auction. The East India Company wrote to Assam to say that the teas had been well received by some “houses of character”, and there was a similar response to the next shipment, some buyers declaring it “excellent”.
• 1851 : Robert Fortune manages to smuggle 10,000 tea seeds, 13,000 plants and saplings and experts from China and lands on the banks of river Hoogly in Bengal Province of India
• 1852 : The FIRST Darjeeling tea estate was planted at Tukvar, Steinthal and Aloobari
• 1853 : Dr. Archibald Campbell reports that the Chinese tea bushes he had planted in his home garden in Darjeeling were thriving at altitudes of 2000 feet to 7000 feet – this was the beginning of the world famous Champagne of Teas  – Darjeeling
• 1859 : the FIRST tea factory in Darjeeling is started at the world famous Makaibari tea estate – this factory is still going strong!

Tea continues its rise in the West

• 1826 : the FIRST tea is retailed in sealed packages under proprietary name by English quaker John Horniman

• 1836 : Jacksons of Piccadilly introduce Earl Grey Tea – “to fulfil wishes of a former Earl Grey”
• 1840 : Afternoon Tea is introduced by Duchess Anna, the seventh Duchess of Bedford
• 1849 : Henry Charles Harrod of 49 Eastcheap takes over a grocery shop at 8 Brompton Road, London, that will grow to become the world’s largest departmental store – Harrods!
• 1850 : the FIRST Tea Clipper – THE ORIENTAL, arrives at London from Hong Kong after a 97 day  voyage, carrying 1600 tonnes of Chinese Tea
• 1865 :  The Langham becomes the FIRST hotel to start an Afternoon Tea service
• 1870 : Twinings starts blending tea for the FIRST time for uniformity
• 1876 : Thomas J. Lipton opens his FIRST grocery shop in Glasgow
• 1876 : The FIRST ever printed recipe for non-sweet iced teas is found in The Buckeye Cookbook by Estelle Woods Wilcox 
• 1879 : the FIRST printed recipe for sweet iced tea in Housekeeping In Old Virginia  by Marion Cabell Tyree
• 1888 : The FIRST commercial plantation of tea is started in the USA at Pinehurst Tea Plantation I South Carolina. Today, this is named as Charleston Tea Plantation
• 1893 : Thomas J. Lipton registers a new trade-mark for tea he has been selling in packages since 1890. Over the facsimile signature “ Thomas J Lipton, Tea Planter, Ceylon”, Lipton prints the words “ non genuine without this signature”
• 1904 : Thomas Sullivan, a New York grocer, accidentally invents the tea-bag when he sends samples of his tea blends to his customers in hand-made muslin bags
• 1904 : Richard Blechynden, the India Tea Commissioner and Director for the East India Pavilion at the World’ Fair in St. Louis, adds blocks of ice to hot tea, and accidentally, invents Iced Tea
• 1922 :  Bai Mudan or White Tea Peony is developed in Fujian in China
• 1930 :  The FIRST CTC machine is in installed at Amgoorie Tea Estate in Assam by its inventor, Sir William McKercher 
• 1953 : White Rose Redi-Tea is introduced by New York’s SEEMAN BROS. – the world’s FIRST instant tea
• 1968 : The FIRST Bai Mudan teas are exported to the West
• 1985 : The FIRST Muscatel tea was made at Castleton tea estate in Darjeeling
• 2001 : The FIRST tea estate in the UK is started at Tregothnan Tea Estate in Cornwall
• 2005 : Tregothnan Tea Estate releases its FIRST tea blend 

From that few humble leaves that accidentally fell in the cauldron of boiling water 5,000 years ago to over 25,000 cups every second, tea has certainly come a long way. The world’s oldest beverage is even more popular than it was in medieval China and even more fashionable as it was in Victorian England. 

Tea’s journey continues…as it get ready to conquer more homes and more hearts across the world!