DOCSLIB.ORG

Lao Banzhang GLOBAL EA HUT Contentsissue 86 / March 2019 Tea & Tao Magazine Forest森林王子 Prince

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Lao Banzhang GLOBAL EA HUT Contentsissue 86 / March 2019 Tea & Tao Magazine Forest森林王子 Prince GLOBAL EA HUT Tea & Tao Magazine 國際茶亭 March 2019 皇 太 子 的 森 林 Lao Banzhang GLOBAL EA HUT ContentsIssue 86 / March 2019 Tea & Tao Magazine Forest森林王子 Prince Lao Banzhang is the most famous, pricey and controversial region in Yunnan, and a must-see stop on the journey of any puerh lover. We are Love is very excited to dive deeper into this important re- gion, all the while sipping from strong cups of one changing the world of the best, most valuable puerh teas that we have ever shared! bowl by bowl Features特稿文章 17 Lao Banzhang: The Prince of Yunnan By Luo Ying Yin (羅英銀) 25 25 Xin “New” Banzhang By Luo Ying Yin (羅英銀) 33 The Changing Market of Lao Banzhang By Lin En Zhao (林恩照) 51 The “Origins” of Tea 17 By Sam Gibb 33 Traditions 古茶 03 Tea of the Month Forest Prince, 2018 Sheng Puerh, Lao Banzhang, Yunnan, China 27 Gongfu Teapot 51 The Shape of the Teapot * ancient tea roots found By Shen Su (聖素) at the Tian Luo Shan site 39 Cha Dao The Elixir of Life 無的 森 By Wu De ( ) © 2019 by Global Tea Hut 林 All rights reserved. 61 TeaWayfarer Frederik Wallin, Sweden 王 recycled & recyclable No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval sys- 子 tem or transmitted in any form or by any means: electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or other- wise, without prior written permis- Soy ink sion from the copyright owner. n March, theFrom weather in Taiwan starts to warmthe up, of you feel like youeditor need to reach some level of expertise to and though it does rain a lot in the end of the month, share your experience, but nothing could be further from the temperature is wonderful. The world comes alive the truth—we are all students here, and all beginners. And at this time, and everything blooms and blossoms as such, we can all stand to benefit from the beginner’s per- Iisland-wide. Taiwan is very vibrant in this month. We really spective. You may not be able to write a scholarly article feel the shift from the cool, dark Yin of winter to the Yang about some very specific aspect of tea knowledge, science of spring starting after the Lunar New Year in February. or history, but you can share your experience and wisdom Of course, those who live in areas with four seasons feel this serving tea, learning about tea, fostering community, the shift much more pronouncedly, but this is really the only effects of tea on your self-cultivation, on your career or ro- seasonal transition we have in Taiwan: from warm to the mantic life and so on. You do have a voice, and you do have cool of winter and then back in the spring. This means we experience, strength, wisdom and hope to share! And we do start drinking young sheng from last year, tasting the age. want to read it! It would mean a lot to me if more of you We also like white and green teas now and again, as well as submitted articles this year. lots of oolong. This month, we are going to dive into a very import- This year’s Annual Global Tea Hut trip is right around ant topic for anyone who loves puerh tea: Lao Banzhang, the corner, from April 14th to the 24th. We are all super ex- a mountain/region in Yunnan where very fine tea comes cited to gather with tea lovers from around the world and from. As a result of the unique character of the tea from travel through the history of tea, walking in the footsteps of Banzhang—which is very strong, vibrant and full of ener- the “Tea Saint,” Lu Yu. We will be traveling from Shanghai gy—the area has achieved great fame. The tea is superb to to Zhejiang, and to Yixing as well. As usual, we will do our drink and wonderful to age, leading to a great demand for best to take all of you along with us for the ride, capturing Banzhang tea that far exceeds what the small area can pro- video and photographs, writing articles about the trip and duce. As a result, prices have skyrocketed. And with that thinking of all of you who wanted to join us, but couldn’t, fame have come all kinds of challenges, including fake tea, by saying prayers and raising bowls of tea for you as we go. environmental issues, decreases in quality due to the fast I wanted to use this forum to make a plea to all of you growth and tremendous influx of money and many more for the coming year(s) of our shared Global Tea Hut ex- issues. Though there still are stunning tea trees at the center perience: please participate more! Of course, this means of the whirlwind that is now “Lao Banzhang,” it is easy to sharing tea and sharing the word about this magazine. (Do get lost in all the hoopla. We hope that this issue will help you know that if everyone in Global Tea Hut got just one you to begin exploring this magical region of Yunnan and friend to join, and we therefore doubled in size, we could also be a warning about some of the problems that great de- start building Light Meets Life right away?) Many of you mand can cause to natural resources. And (we can’t believe are already doing this, and we are so incredibly grateful. it), we will be drinking a Lao Banzhang tea throughout our Let us know if there is any way we can help you spread the journey! word, like using our photography, writing, extra magazine copies and sometimes we can even send extra tins of tea you can use. Let’s all work together to grow the membership of Global Tea Hut this year like never before! Help us with our social media campaign and with word of mouth so that Wu De we can continue improving the magazine with more travel, better teas and more translations. Also, our ultimate goal is, obviously, to build your Tea Center, Light Meets Life: a place where you can come and study tea. It will be a flag for all Chajin around the world and for future generations of tea lovers to use as well. –Further Reading– Beyond just spreading the word about Global Tea Hut, one of the ways that you can participate is by writing for the magazine. We really, truly and absolutely do want to This month, we highly recommend re-reading the hear from you. Throughout the years, at least half of my special Extended Edition from September 2014 personal top ten articles for this magazine are from what we (the first-ever Extended Edition), which is jam- call “Voices from the Hut,” which means articles submit- packed with information on puerh tea. You can ted by the readership on all kinds of topics. I genuinely am find past issues archived on the website with an inspired by them and learn a lot. I think that maybe some easy-to-use search function! 2 of the ver the course of this month, we will be exploring has been swallowed). As a result, it has become famous the Lao Banzhang region of Yunnan, which means throughout the world. To tea lovers, Banzhang Village has the “Old” Banzhang Village (there is a “New” one become one of the holy places of puerh tea. as well). Lao Banzhang produces excellent old-growth mao- For a long time, we have wanted to translate some ar- cha every year and has for centuries. In modern times, it ticles about Lao Banzhang, but we were unsure of how we has become incredibly famous and extremely valuable (the could ever share some tea with you since the prices are so most expensive puerh each year), which has caused a lot astronomical. We let all of our friends and tea family know of challenges for local tea producers, as producers all over that we were interested in anything remotely affordable even Yunnan fake Lao Banzhang tea. They say that Lao Banzhang years ago, knowing that there was a growing body of great can only produce roughly seven tons of tea annually, but articles written by puerh experts that we could translate at more than 3,000 tons of tea labeled as “Lao Banzhang” are any time. Eventually the wait paid off: Forest Prince. sold every year in the largest puerh market in Guangzhou, Forest Prince is certified organic tea from Lao Banzhang, called “Fangcun Market (芳村市場).” The village has had to grown in an eco-garden, which means rich biodiversity. It is erect a wall and build guarded gates to prevent people from much more affordable than the best Lao Banzhang tea, how- bringing in tea from other regions to sell as “Banzhang” ever, as it is produced from young trees—averaging thirty tea, and has taken other steps to prevent forgery. In all of to forty years old. But even with the great discount, it is still this noise, some of the quality of the tea has sadly been dis- expensive relative to other young sheng puerhs, which are rupted, as have the lives of the villagers. all expensive nowadays. This is one of the most valuable Despite all the chaos and market demand (which far ex- teas we have ever shared in Global Tea Hut, and it would ceeds production) there is real quality behind Lao Banzhang not have been possible without the kind generosity of a dear tea.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • TEATIPSBRIEF100 100 Pieces of Info to Use in Tea Stories Issue 1
    Olga Nikandrova. Denis Shumakov TEATIPSBRIEF100 100 pieces of info to use in tea stories Issue 1. 2017 www.facebook.com/teatipsbrief/ www.teatips.ru Table of content Tea micro-trends .............................................................................................................................................. 5 Micro-trend. Tea and wine experiments ................................................................................................................... 5 One more time on tea machines. Teforia Leaf ........................................................................................................ 5 Micro-trend. Nitro Tea ..................................................................................................................................................... 6 Nano-trend. Teafe in Raipur and Bangalore ............................................................................................................ 7 Micro-Trend. Cheese tea. 40 degrees and 15 minutes ......................................................................................... 7 Micro-trend: kombuchading kombucha at topical bars ........................................................................................ 8 Ambient Brew: Tea and Food Pairing ......................................................................................................................... 9 Micro-trend: Albino tea cultivars ..............................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Tea Horse Road April 8-14, 2014
    lijiang Michael Freeman Acclaimed Photographer and Bestselling Author & present The Lijiang Tea Horse Road April 8-14, 2014 The 3rd Three Skills Photography Workshop The Spring Michael Freeman photo workshop at The Bivou, Lijiang, takes masterclasses to a new level with a programme that sets participants on the path to fully rounded photography. At the heart of the masterclass is the assignment. For the 7 days that they spend in the Lijiang area, participants will be working as a group on an editorial photo assignment called The Lijiang Tea Horse Road. Just as for a magazine, we’ll be illustrating with our cameras this section of the ancient trade route, bringing it to life by focusing on a few Limited Availability spectacular locations: Old Lijiang, Yulong Mountain and Register Now Online Baoshan Stone City. With Michael guiding the shoot and as picture editor, this group assignment will be published www.bivou.com/photoreg both on-line and as a 50-page book. The Three Essential Skills For rewarding, satisfying photography, indeed to be a complete photographer, you need to have, and balance, three different kinds of skill. They are: technical, visual and conceptual. Technical skills are to do with camera handling, knowing about exposure, depth of field, processing pictures on the computer, and so on. Almost all books and websites about photography focus on these, and they’re essential - but only the beginning of the story, Visual skills are more about seeing, and appreciating, framing images in the viewfinder, and of course composition. This, frankly, is when photography stops being nerdy and starts to become fascinating.
    [Show full text]
  • Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia 03-11-09 12:04
    Tea - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia 03-11-09 12:04 Tea From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Tea is the agricultural product of the leaves, leaf buds, and internodes of the Camellia sinensis plant, prepared and cured by various methods. "Tea" also refers to the aromatic beverage prepared from the cured leaves by combination with hot or boiling water,[1] and is the common name for the Camellia sinensis plant itself. After water, tea is the most widely-consumed beverage in the world.[2] It has a cooling, slightly bitter, astringent flavour which many enjoy.[3] The four types of tea most commonly found on the market are black tea, oolong tea, green tea and white tea,[4] all of which can be made from the same bushes, processed differently, and in the case of fine white tea grown differently. Pu-erh tea, a post-fermented tea, is also often classified as amongst the most popular types of tea.[5] Green Tea leaves in a Chinese The term "herbal tea" usually refers to an infusion or tisane of gaiwan. leaves, flowers, fruit, herbs or other plant material that contains no Camellia sinensis.[6] The term "red tea" either refers to an infusion made from the South African rooibos plant, also containing no Camellia sinensis, or, in Chinese, Korean, Japanese and other East Asian languages, refers to black tea. Contents 1 Traditional Chinese Tea Cultivation and Technologies 2 Processing and classification A tea bush. 3 Blending and additives 4 Content 5 Origin and history 5.1 Origin myths 5.2 China 5.3 Japan 5.4 Korea 5.5 Taiwan 5.6 Thailand 5.7 Vietnam 5.8 Tea spreads to the world 5.9 United Kingdom Plantation workers picking tea in 5.10 United States of America Tanzania.
    [Show full text]
  • Teahouses and the Tea Art: a Study on the Current Trend of Tea Culture in China and the Changes in Tea Drinking Tradition
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by NORA - Norwegian Open Research Archives Teahouses and the Tea Art: A Study on the Current Trend of Tea Culture in China and the Changes in Tea Drinking Tradition LI Jie Master's Thesis in East Asian Culture and History (EAST4591 – 60 Credits – Autumn 2015) Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages Faculty of Humanities UNIVERSITY OF OSLO 24 November, 2015 © LI Jie 2015 Teahouses and the Tea Art: A Study on the Current Trend of Tea Culture in China and the Changes in Tea Drinking Tradition LI Jie http://www.duo.uio.no Print: University Print Center, University of Oslo II Summary The subject of this thesis is tradition and the current trend of tea culture in China. In order to answer the following three questions “ whether the current tea culture phenomena can be called “tradition” or not; what are the changes in tea cultural tradition and what are the new features of the current trend of tea culture; what are the endogenous and exogenous factors which influenced the change in the tea drinking tradition”, I did literature research from ancient tea classics and historical documents to summarize the development history of Chinese tea culture, and used two month to do fieldwork on teahouses in Xi’an so that I could have a clear understanding on the current trend of tea culture. It is found that the current tea culture is inherited from tradition and changed with social development. Tea drinking traditions have become more and more popular with diverse forms.
    [Show full text]
  • Masterpiece Era Puerh GLOBAL EA HUT Contentsissue 83 / December 2018 Tea & Tao Magazine Blue藍印 Mark
    GL BAL EA HUT Tea & Tao Magazine 國際茶亭 December 2018 紅 印 藍 印印 級 Masterpiece Era Puerh GLOBAL EA HUT ContentsIssue 83 / December 2018 Tea & Tao Magazine Blue藍印 Mark To conclude this amazing year, we will be explor- ing the Masterpiece Era of puerh tea, from 1949 to 1972. Like all history, understanding the eras Love is of puerh provides context for today’s puerh pro- duction. These are the cakes producers hope to changing the world create. And we are, in fact, going to drink a com- memorative cake as we learn! bowl by bowl Features特稿文章 37 A Brief History of Puerh Tea Yang Kai (楊凱) 03 43 Masterpiece Era: Red Mark Chen Zhitong (陳智同) 53 Masterpiece Era: Blue Mark Chen Zhitong (陳智同) 37 31 Traditions傳統文章 03 Tea of the Month “Blue Mark,” 2000 Sheng Puerh, Yunnan, China 31 Gongfu Teapot Getting Started in Gongfu Tea By Shen Su (聖素) 53 61 TeaWayfarer Gordon Arkenberg, USA © 2018 by Global Tea Hut 藍 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be re- produced, stored in a retrieval system 印 or transmitted in any form or by any means: electronic, mechanical, pho- tocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the copyright owner. n December,From the weather is much cooler in Taiwan.the We This is an excitingeditor issue for me. I have always wanted to are drinking Five Element blends, shou puerh and aged find a way to take us on a tour of the eras of puerh. Puerh sheng. Occasionally, we spice things up with an aged from before 1949 is known as the “Antique Era (號級茶時 oolong or a Cliff Tea.
    [Show full text]
  • Mapping the Tea Horse Road 2016-03-07 Xiaohong Wang 王小红
    Mapping the Tea Horse Road 2016-03-07 Xiaohong Wang 王小红 Associate Professor, Institute of Collection and Research of Ancient Books, Sichuan University http://www.iq.harvard.edu/people/wang-xiaohong The ancient Tea Horse Road (chamagudao 茶马古道) was one of the world’s highest and most precipitous ancient roads, and was a trade route mainly through Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet, stretched across Bhutan and Sikkim, Nepal and India, and then reached Western Asia and even the Red Sea coast in Western Africa. In ancient times, people in Sichuan and Yunnan provinces exchanged tea for horses or medicines with people in Tibet. The tea, the medicine and the other materials were transported by caravans (mabang 马帮), and thus the pathway was called the Tea Horse Road, which was first named by Mu Jihong in 1990 when he and other five people first explored it. The ancient Tea Horse Road was an enormous network of trails which grew up between Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet in the long historical period. Generally speaking, it was divided into two major roads: Sichuan-Tibet Tea Horse Road and Yunnan-Tibet Tea Horse Road. The Sichuan-Tibet Tea Horse Road appeared in the Tang Dynasty, starting from Ya'an (雅安) to Lhasa (拉薩) via Luding (瀘定), Kangding (康定), Litang (理塘), Markam (芒康) and Chamdo (昌都), extending to the outside countries of Nepal, Burma and India. The Yunnan-Tibet Tea Horse Road was formed roughly in the late part of the 6th century, it began from Pu'er (普洱) to Lhasa, crossing Dali (大 理), Lijiang (麗江), and Shangri-La (香格里拉), continuing to Nepal, Burma and India.
    [Show full text]
  • The Tea Horse Road Guide Part 2
    THE TEA HORSE ROAD GUIDE PART 2 LIJIANG TO MEILI SNOW MOUNTAIN WRITTEN BY MICHAEL FREEMAN COURTESY OF LUX* 2 LIJIANG TO MEILI SNOW MOUNTAIN INTRODUCTION 3 INTRODUCTION Between the 7th century and the middle of the 20th, one of the longest trade route, because in return for tea, which Tibetans came quickly to trade routes in the Ancient World, more than 3,000 kilometres, carried crave, the Tang dynasty wanted horses for the Imperial Army. The route tea from its homeland in the deep south of Yunnan to Tibet. It was added came under strict control, as the trading of tea for war horses became to by a route from a second source, the tea mountains of Sichuan, and the an arm of Tang foreign policy in its dealing with a neighbour that had combined network of stone roads and mountain trails became known as risen from a loose collection of tribal societies to a military power on the the Tea Horse Road, Cha Ma Dao. This was much more than a simple empire’s northwestern border. The Tea Horse Road, marked in red, began in the tea mountains of Caravan on Xishuangbanna and worked its way north through Yunnan to the Tibetan a cliff-cut trail Plateau, later joined by a second route from Sichuan Lead horse in a tea caravan 4 LIJIANG TO MEILI SNOW MOUNTAIN THE TEA HORSE ROAD the tea west to join the Yunnan route As the trade developed, it became a and continue to Lhasa. saga of epic proportions, combining These are the broad strokes, but a true odyssey of a journey, long and the Tea Horse Road was a network, difficult, with exchanges between in some stretches coalescing into one, very different cultures.
    [Show full text]
  • Sudanworkingpaper
    SUDANWORKINGPAPER Comparing borderland dynamics Processes of territorialisation in the Nuba Mountains in Sudan, southern Yunnan in China, and the Pamir Mountains in Tajikistan Leif Ole Manger Department of Social Anthropology, (UiB) Universtity of Bergen SWP 2015: 3 The programme Assisting Regional Universities in Sudan and South Sudan (ARUSS) aims to build academic bridges between Sudan and South Sudan. The overall objective is to enhance the quality and relevance of teaching and research in regional universities. As part of the program, research is carried out on a number of topics which are deemed important for lasting peace and development within and between the two countries. Efforts are also made to influence policy debates and improve the basis for decision making in both countries as well as among international actors. ARUSS is supported by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. About the author Leif Ole Manger is Professor in the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Bergen. His research has emphasis on the Horn of Africa, the Middle East and the Indian Ocean, with long-term field research in the Sudan, and shorter fieldworks in Yemen, Hyderabad, India, Singapore and China. His research focuses on economic and ecological anthropology, development studies, planning, land tenure, trade, communal labour, Arabization and Islamization. Mixing a broad cultural historical understanding of a region with current events is also important in Manger’s latest work on borders and borderland populations. Regionally this work focuses the borderland situations between Sudan and the new nation state of South Sudan, between post-Soviet Tajikistan, China and Afghanistan, and between contemporary China, Myanmar and India.
    [Show full text]
  • Pu-Erh Tea Tasting in Yunnan, China: Correlation of Drinkers’ Perceptions to Phytochemistry
    Pu-erh Tea Tasting in Yunnan, China: Correlation of Drinkers’ Perceptions to Phytochemistry Authors: Selena Ahmed, Uchenna Unachukwu, John Richard Stepp, Charles M. Peters, Chunlin Long, and Edward Kennelly NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Journal of Ethnopharmacology. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Journal of Ethnopharmacology, VOL# 132, ISSUE# 1, (October 2010), DOI# 10.1016/j.jep.2010.08.016. Ahmed, Selena, Uchenna Unachukwu, John Richard Stepp, Charles M. Peters, Chunlin Long, and Edward Kennelly. “Pu-Erh Tea Tasting in Yunnan, China: Correlation of Drinkers’ Perceptions to Phytochemistry.” Journal of Ethnopharmacology 132, no. 1 (October 2010): 176–185. doi:10.1016/j.jep.2010.08.016. Made available through Montana State University’s ScholarWorks scholarworks.montana.edu Pu-erh tea tasting in Yunnan, China: Correlation of drinkers’ perceptions to phytochemistry Selena Ahmed a,b,c,d,e,∗, Uchenna Unachukwu c,f, John Richard Stepp d,g, Charles M. Peters a,d, Chunlin Long d,e, Edward Kennelly b,c,d,f a Institute of Economic Botany, The New York Botanical Garden, Bronx, NY 10458, USA b Department of Biology, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, 365 Fifth Avenue, NY 10016, USA c Department
    [Show full text]
  • Studies on External Transportation Development and Spatial Structure Transformation of Modern Kunming from a Southeast Asian
    The 18th International Planning History Society Conference - Yokohama, July 2018 Studies on External Transportation Development and Spatial Structure Transformation of Modern Kunming from a Southeast Asian Perspective, 1885- 1945 Tianjie ZHANG *, Yuqi ZHANG ** * Associate Professor, School of Architecture, Tianjin University, China, [email protected] ** Postgraduate, School of Architecture, Tianjin University, China From a regional perspective of Southeast Asia, the paper focuses on Kunming, a gateway between China and Southeast Asian countries. The research elucidates the planning ideas and construction process of external routes, via both land and air, such as Yunnan-Vietnam Railway, Yunnan-Burma Railway, Burma Road, Stilwell Road and Hump Airline in early 20th century. These external routes became the arteries of cargo transportation, and Kunming became a regional economic center and military command center during wartime. The paper further reveals the transformation of Kunming’s spatial structures influenced by these external routes, which accelerated Kunming’s urban growth along the traffic lines. The city center shifted to the Station area, where industrial and commercial developments also congregated. New industrial zones were planned to the east and north of the old city, where new passages brought more convenient transportations. The internal road network plan also emphasized the connection with new railway station and bus stations. The research construes the planning ideas and implementation, traces their theoretical origins, and uncovers their indigenous considerations. Keywords: Urban Planning History of Modern China, Regional Perspective of Southeast Asia, Kunming, External Routes, Spatial Structures Fund Items: Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China No. 51778403, 51478299; Innovation Project of University Students (No.
    [Show full text]
  • Steeped in the Moment
    Point of View thought to what tea might be like in its natural state? I had only experienced it when it was ready to use, completely dry and curled. STEEPED IN THE MOMENT, CONTINUED FROM PAGE 64 While Josephie talked, we sipped tiny Australia and Texas (which made for cups of several teas with particular his- a fabulous accent). She was teaching a torical significance. “You have to use all wildly ambitious two-hour course on the of your senses when drinking tea,” she history, preparation, and culture of tea. said. “The sixth sense is your soul. You I was eager to meet Josephie because I’d might find that, when you really smell the heard that she was beginning to grow tea tea, it will bring back memories.” She was in Idaho, the first attempt in the state. right, of course. When I stopped and paid She’d planted seedlings from Russia and attention, I could suddenly be in a small Nepal, and they’d already survived nearly tea shop in Seattle, sipping too-hot lav- two winters since her arrival in 2015. ender black tea too quickly, or sitting on In 2009 Josephie began to grow a test the floor in my college boyfriend’s apart- plot of tea plants in East Texas, becom- ment, trying strong, fermented Pu’er for ing the first female tea farmer in the the first time. United States and the first tea farmer Several weeks later, I met Josephie in all of Texas, ignoring those who told for tea at Gaiwan. Once settled at our her it wasn’t possible to grow tea there, table, she removed two sets of carefully since no one ever had.
    [Show full text]
  • Thé En Chine
    Thé en Chine Le thé (sinogramme 茶), bien plus qu'une simple boisson d'agrément, représente en Chine une véritable institution sociale et culinaire, riche d'une histoire de plusieurs millénaires. Les feuilles de théier sauvage ont sans doute été utilisées dès l'époque préhistorique, dans leur région d'origine située au sud- ouest du pays, pour des besoins alimentaires et médicinaux, et par la suite le théier a été domestiqué et sa culture s'est étendue durant la fin de l'Antiquité et le début de l'époque médiévale, dans la moitié méridionale du pays. Le thé devient une véritable Thé chinois. boissons nationale chinoise à l'époque de la dynastie Tang (618-907), quand les élites lettrées commencent à célébrer ses plus grands crus. C'est à cette époque un produit circulant sous la forme de briques compactes, émiettées en poudre fine qui infusait dans une eau bouillante avec d'autres épices. Sous les Song (960-1279) toutes les couches de la société consomment du thé, bu après avoir été fouetté. Les époques Ming (1362-1644) et Qing (1644-1911) voient se mettent en place les variétés et formes de consommation modernes du thé : du thé en feuilles séchées et chauffées dans un récipient métallique, permettant de préparer la forme de base, le thé vert, et à partir duquel sont développées d'autres méthodes permettant de produire d'autres variétés qui sont, dans la terminologie chinoise : les thés rouges (le thé noir en Occident), bleu-verts (ou wulong, oolong), blancs, jaunes, noirs (sombres ou Pu'er en Occident).
    [Show full text]