History of coffee

Coffee is a beverage prepared from the roasted seeds of the Coffea plant. Its history spans several centuries, beginning with wild plants native to the highlands of Ethiopia and the development of the drink itself in Yemen in the 15th century. From the Arabian Peninsula it spread throughout the Islamic world and, later, to Europe and the Americas, becoming one of the world’s most widely consumed beverages and a major global commodity.

Origins

Botanical origins

The coffee plant (Coffea arabica) is indigenous to the montane forests of southwestern Ethiopia (particularly the Kaffa/Kefa region) and adjacent areas of South Sudan and northern Kenya. Wild coffee trees still grow in these highlands at elevations of roughly 1,500–2,500 metres. Other species, notably Coffea canephora (robusta), originated further west in central Africa.

Legendary discovery

A well-known legend attributes the discovery of coffee’s stimulating effects to an Ethiopian goatherd named Kaldi (sometimes dated to the 9th century). According to the story, Kaldi noticed that his goats became unusually energetic after eating the red berries of a certain evergreen bush. He tried the berries himself, experienced a similar invigoration, and shared the discovery with local monks, who then used the fruit to stay awake during long prayers.

The Kaldi tale first appeared in European literature in the 17th century and is considered apocryphal by historians. Earlier Arabic sources do not mention it. More reliable evidence points to the use of coffee (or coffee-like preparations) in Ethiopia well before its documented appearance as a beverage in Yemen.

Spread to the Arabian Peninsula

By the mid-15th century, coffee had been introduced across the Red Sea to Yemen. There it was first cultivated on a significant scale in the highlands and prepared as a roasted, ground, and brewed drink. Sufi circles in Yemen are credited with popularising the beverage, using it to maintain alertness during nocturnal religious observances (dhikr).

The port of Mocha (al-Mukhā) on the Red Sea coast became the principal centre of the early coffee trade. Yemen maintained a near-monopoly on commercial production for roughly two centuries, carefully controlling the export of viable seeds.

Coffee drinking spread rapidly through the Islamic world in the late 15th and early 16th centuries: first to Mecca and Medina, then to Cairo, Damascus, Aleppo, and other cities. By the early 16th century it had reached the Ottoman capital, Istanbul.

Coffee culture in the Middle East and the Ottoman Empire

Public coffee houses (qahveh khaneh or kahvehane) emerged as important social institutions. Men gathered to drink coffee, converse, play games such as chess and backgammon, listen to music, and discuss politics and news. These establishments sometimes attracted official suspicion because of the free exchange of ideas they fostered.

Attempts to ban coffee occurred periodically. In 1511 the governor of Mecca ordered the destruction of coffee stocks and the punishment of drinkers; similar prohibitions were attempted elsewhere. Ottoman authorities eventually accepted and even promoted the drink. The first recorded coffee house in Istanbul opened in 1554 (or 1555 according to some sources). Within decades, hundreds of such establishments operated in the city.

Introduction to Europe

European travellers and merchants encountered coffee in the Ottoman Empire and the Levant in the late 16th century. Venetian traders brought the beverage to Italy around 1615. Some clergy initially condemned it as a “bitter invention of Satan,” but Pope Clement VIII is said to have tasted it and approved its consumption by Christians.

The first European coffee house outside Ottoman territory opened in Venice in the mid-17th century. Coffee houses then appeared in rapid succession: - Oxford (1650) - London (1652) - Marseille and Paris (1670s) - Vienna, Hamburg, and other German cities (late 17th century)

In England, coffee houses became known as “penny universities” because for the price of a cup patrons could read newspapers, debate ideas, and conduct business. Several major financial and commercial institutions (including early forms of the stock exchange and insurance markets) developed in or around these establishments.

Global expansion of cultivation

Until the end of the 17th century, almost all commercially traded coffee came from Yemen via Mocha. As European demand grew, colonial powers sought to break the monopoly by establishing plantations elsewhere.

• The Dutch obtained plants or seeds from Mocha and successfully cultivated coffee on Java (beginning in the 1690s). “Java” became a synonym for coffee.
• The French introduced coffee to the Caribbean island of Martinique in the 1720s (notably through the efforts of Gabriel de Clieu). From there it spread to other French colonies, including Saint-Domingue (Haiti), which by the late 18th century supplied a large share of the world’s coffee.
• Coffee reached Brazil in the early 18th century and expanded dramatically in the 19th century. Brazil became the world’s largest producer by the mid-19th century and has retained that position ever since.
• Cultivation also spread to India, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Central America, and later to East Africa and Vietnam.

The expansion of plantation agriculture was closely tied to European colonialism and, in many regions, to systems of forced or enslaved labour.

Later developments

In the 19th and 20th centuries coffee became a mass commodity. Improvements in transportation, roasting technology, and packaging (including vacuum-packed ground coffee and instant coffee) made it widely available. Major producing countries organised around export markets, and consuming countries developed distinct national coffee cultures (espresso in Italy, filter coffee in northern Europe and North America, Turkish coffee traditions, etc.).

The late 20th and early 21st centuries saw the rise of the specialty coffee movement, emphasising origin, processing methods, roasting profiles, and sustainable or direct-trade sourcing. Ethiopia remains both a major producer and the genetic centre of diversity for Coffea arabica.

Today coffee is one of the most valuable agricultural commodities in international trade and is consumed daily by hundreds of millions of people worldwide.