• The first western reference to tea was in a 1559 volume of travel literature entitled Voyages and Travels, compiled by GiambattaistaRamusio (Jonnes 1982: 101). It describes tea as a hot drink with medicinal qualities.
  • Traditionally served primarily to men, it was first called Cha, from the Cantonese slang for tea. The name changed later to Tay, or Tee, when the British trading post moved from Canton to Amoy, where the word for tea is T'e
  • London coffee houses were responsible for its introduction to England shortly before the Stuart Restoration (1660)
  • First sold in apothecaries and a few coffeehouses, the acceptance of tea into British culture was relatively slow.
  • One of the first coffee house merchants to offer tea was Thomas Garway, He sold both liquid and dry tea as early as 1657.
  • In London "Coffee, chocolate and a kind of drink called tee" were "sold in almost every street in 1659"
  • By 1660, Garwaysold it at £6- £10 per pound, touting its virtues at "making the body active and lusty", and "preserving perfect health until extreme old age".
  • Tea was mainly consumed by the fashionably rich: Samuel Pepys, curious for every novelty, tasted the new drink in 1660: [25 September] "I did send for a cup of tee, (a China drink) of which I had never had drunk before"
  • Theory that it had numerous healing properties spread (especially for gout, as there was none in China).
  • In 1662 Catherine of Braganza of Portugal married Charles II and she brought with her a preference for tea, which had already become common in Europe. As tea was her temperance drink of choice, it gained social acceptance among the aristocracy, as she used it to replace wine, ale and spirits as the court drink.
  • Her choice of tea as a beverage was instrumental in its popularisation in Britain. It hadbeen primarily introduced through male frequented coffee houses, meaning there would have been far less social acceptability for women to drink tea had it not been for her example.
  • Tea had begun to replace gin and ale in popularity, meaning the government received less revenue from the taxes on liquor sales.
  • Charles II wanted to counter the growth of tea by trying to make it forbidden to sell it in public houses, but this was unpopular and hard to enforce.
  • By 1676, tea was taxed and a license requiredto sell it. This led to tea smuggling by the mid 18th century.
  • Its Royal origins in Britain gave the impression drinking required a level of ceremony, such as elaborate rituals, modes of dress and specialist tools.
  • Changed manners, mannerisms and the idea of hospitality, as offering tea and hosting tea drinking became signs of high culture
  • East India Trading Company began importing directly from China in 1669.
  • By 1686 it was selling in markets, and considered to be a part of their regular trade, rather than only a specialty item
  • Imports began to outpace coffee and chocolate by 1720, and tripled between 1720 and 1750
  • Cost had declined so much by 1750, drinking became almost universal
  • This desire for cheap luxury goods altered global trading