Chinese tea has always been very different.
Shennong borrowed tea to detoxify hundreds of poisons, and King Nagong of Zhou took tea from Shu. Since the tea saint Lu Yu created the "Tea Classic", the status of tea has been further improved. To this day, the reverence for the tea ceremony has long become a culture, quite detached.
However, when a tea leaf is picked and entered into our cup, it has already undergone countless baptisms from a war.
Before it was put on the table, the large tea field was always a battlefield for fighting.
01. There is Jiamu in the south
What is tea?
Today, the meaning of tea is widespread, as long as it is roasted plants with hot water, it seems that it can be called tea. Fruits, flowers, and even vegetables, in one sip, are fragrant and sweet.
However, in the "Explanation of Words and Words", it is said that tea is called: "Bitter Diya".
The original meaning of the word 荼 refers to a kind of bitter vegetable, and to use it to define tea, it is actually bitter and bitter! Come to think of it, a long time ago, when tea was still a wild vegetable, it was certainly not very likable.
But when people find that it has other uses besides filling their stomachs, this suffering is a different matter.
Hangzhou Longjing Tea Field Photo: Yu Han
The Tea Sutra says: "Tea is to drink, and it is sent to the Shennong clan." "According to legend, when Shennong was tasting hundreds of herbs in the wild, he accidentally got poisoned, and thanks to a few pieces of tea leaves that fell into the iron pot of boiling water, he successfully unlocked the poison.
Later, Shennong picked a lot of this green leaf and went back, found that it could detoxify hundreds of poisons, and instructed posterity to plant it, and named it "tea". It is written in the "Shennong Tastes Hundred Herbs": "Shennong tasted hundreds of herbs, encountered seventy-two poisons every day, and got rid of them", which is precisely from this.
Yandi Shennong clan "Shennong tastes hundred grasses"
In the eyes of the ancients, these young leaves plucked from the tree have a wonderful use that is not inferior to the ganoderma lucidum. The works of successive physicians such as Hua Tuo of the Three Kingdoms, Zhang Zhongjing of the Han Dynasty, Tao Hongjing of the Liang Dynasty, sun Simiao, the king of medicine, and the pharmacopoeia compiled by the officials of the past, have recorded the prescription of tea in detail.
Chen Zangqi, a great medical scientist of the Tang Dynasty, even said in the "Materia Medica": "The medicines are the medicines for each disease, and the tea is the medicine for all diseases", which almost deified the medicinal value of tea.
Eight treasure chrysanthemum tea, according to the different prescriptions, has the effect of activating blood pressure and lowering blood pressure, relieving heat and expectorant
When people learned about the medical effects of tea, they were less concerned about the bitterness when they were introduced.
Even, due to its pungent aroma when brewed, and the beauty of returning sweetness after bitterness, tea eventually spread and became one of the most common drinks in China.
At this point, tea has been marked in China. As Lu Yu wrote in the Tea Classic: "Tea people, the southern Jiamuya." ”
It is an "all-powerful" medicinal herb, and when people use it to refresh and detoxify, its taste of "who is bitter, its sweetness is like a thorn", but also left an unforgettable mark on the tip of the Chinese tongue.
Since the Tang and Song dynasties, it has become "tea as food, no different from rice salt", "gentlemen and villains are not addicted, rich and poor are not used", and have become one of the indispensable "seven things to open the door" in the lives of the people.
Tea Tasting Chart Ming Wen Zheng Zheng National Palace Museum in Taipei
Even the nomadic people in the northwest, who are located on the frontier, "eat their fishy flesh, do not consume tea, the heat of green crops, and do not understand tea", so as to "rely on tea for life", and cannot live without this king for a day.
However, it is not enough to define tea by this factor alone.
02. Enlightenment
There is no shortage of drinks at the Chinese table. Some of the stronger ones have wine, some sweeter ones have cheese, not to mention all kinds of pulps, sour, sweet, bitter and spicy, endless.
Imitation Song people selling pulp figure Qing Yao Wenhan Collection of the National Palace Museum in Taipei
Tea, native to the Bashu region and the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, the earliest accounts of "tea" and "fragrant tea" in ancient texts are also in the territory of Baguo in eastern Sichuan. In the vast Central Plains region, the beauty of tea is not well known.
From this point of view, even with the legend of Shennong as a backing, tea is just a part of the Chinese drink army.
Nowadays, the Yunnan-Guichuan area is still one of the important tea producing areas in the mainland, and the famous Dianhong and Shiquan moss teas are all specialty teas in this area
However, since tea had proved its worth, monks and literati took over the baton of this war by virtue of their love for tea.
As early as the Western Han Dynasty, tea was already a popular drink in the southwest. However, until the Three Kingdoms and Two Jin Dynasties, Buddhist and Taoist religious activities were popular, and tea, with its quiet and indifferent temperament, spread further with the spread of religion.
《Bong Cha Tu》
According to the "Lushan Chronicle", during the Eastern Han Dynasty, there were already monks gathered in Lushan. Not only do we enter the mountain every year to make tea, but we also transplant tea trees into the temple garden. Hui Yuan, a famous monk of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, gathered monks here to plant tea, and he often "talked about tea and poetry, and narrated the scriptures until he stayed up all night."
With more such things, tea plant cultivation has gradually spread in the vast southeast region, and there are relevant records in various regions:
"Jingzhou Land Record": "Wuling seven counties through the tea, the best." And: "Fuling tea is the best." ”
"Guangzhou Chronicle": "Youping County out of Gao Lu, the alias of Tea, the leaves are large and astringent, and the southerners think that they drink." ”
In addition, the Yiling Tujing, Huaiyin Tujing, Yongjia Tujing, And Kudizhi and other chronicles also record many tea-growing areas.
Tea mountains with tea farmers
But the tea ceremony is flourishing, and it still depends on the Tang Dynasty.
Since the Tang Kaiyuan period, the tea style has prevailed, from the Tianzi to the people of Li, almost all of them drink tea to varying degrees.
According to Zhao Zhenxin's "Notes on the Fengshi Wenzhi Records": "In the Kaiyuan Dynasty, taishan Lingyan Temple has a magician Daxing Zen sect, who learns Zen, and does not sleep, and does not eat at night, and is allowed to drink tea. People are self-possessed, boiling and drinking everywhere, and from then on they have imitated them, and it has become a custom. ”
Xiao Yi earns Lanting Tu Southern Song Dynasty Anon. The National Palace Museum in Taipei is a restoration of the Tang Dynasty Sencha method
However, the tea affairs at this time are still imitating the Six Dynasties period, or eating tea, far from what we are familiar with.
Until Lu Yu wrote the "Tea Classic", there were detailed discussions on tea planting, tea picking, the choice of tea sets, the heat of boiling tea, the use of water and how to taste it, and the matter of drinking tea was eventually elevated to the position of literati style.
The binding with the literati made tea inherently have a foundation for cultural dissemination.
At that time, there were poets, painters, calligraphers, and musicians who were active in the literary world, and there were not a few people who loved tea. Meng Haoran used tea instead of wine to "drink tea and chat instead of drunk", and Wei Yingwu borrowed tea Mingzhi and said that he was: "Cleanliness cannot be polluted, and it is annoying to drink clean dust." ”
Bai Juyi didn't care about these, he just wanted to share with people who loved tea: "There is no reason to cling to a profit, send it to the tea lover", even Li Bai, who is drunk as a life, is impressed by tea: "Gen Ke Hao Fangjin, dress and moisturize the muscles and bones." ”
Wenhui tu Northern Song Dynasty Zhao Tuo Taipei National Palace Museum
The literati and scholars not only tasted tea and commented on water, but even participated in the cultivation of famous teas, chanting tea poems, making tea paintings, and writing tea books. They meet friends with tea, set up tea rooms, and hold tea banquets.
In their writings, the loss of color in water is for blending, elegance is for innocence, interpretation is for universal benefit, and lack of water is for humility.
If excessive drinking is not good for health, then drinking tea can not be found out that there is nothing wrong, perhaps because it is too simple, but has become the deepest connotation. A small plant of grass and trees actually has the unique temperament of the entire national spirit of Haina.
03. Out of the mountains
The endorsement of the literati seems to have set the tone for the prevalence of tea.
However, since tea has become popular, the subsequent profits cannot be underestimated. When the literati and gentlemen indulged in elegance, the courtiers were already plotting in secret.
Emperor Wen of Sui
According to the historical record: "When Emperor Wen of Sui was young, he dreamed of replacing the bones of the mind for the gods, and since then he has been trapped by a headache, and then he encountered a monk: there is tea grass in the mountains, and it can be cured by frying and drinking, and the fruit of the imperial service is healed." ”
It didn't matter whether this thing was true or not, after all, the ultimate purpose of the person who offered tea to the Immortal Palace was to make it fall into red dust.
After the Sui and Tang dynasties, tea became a special hobby of the emperors and nobles, and the act of "tribute tea" was passed down through the generations. There is a cloud in the Tang Dynasty scribe Quan Shu poem: "Reading the history of the scriptures to take a name is not as good as picking a cart of tea." ”
The Tang Dynasty painted the "Gongle Tu", some of the ladies are scooping tea, some are burning, and some are tasting tea.
Due to the favor of the emperor and the promotion of the officials, some scribes who coveted fame and positions all tried to meet them, so the wind of tribute tea was even more expanded. After the tea farmers harvest the tea leaves, they often have to pay taxes and then even out a part of the tea leaves for the purpose of "tribute".
There are even many places where there are government-run "mountain fields." Farmers who grow tea in the mountain farm are called "garden households", and except for a part of the tea produced for tax payment, the rest are sold to the mountain farm and cannot be bought and sold freely.
Tea farmers picking tea
In order to drink better tea, the emperor of the Qing Dynasty verified the "Eighteen Imperial Tea Trees" tea trees, specified the landscape for the tea-producing areas, selected the imperial roads where the tea leaves came out of the mountains, and even named the springs such as "Tiger Run" and "Longjing".
Hangzhou West Lake, Tiger Running Dream Spring Photo: Yu Han
After the tribute tea, the merchants who came after profit inadvertently raised the value of tea again.
Bai Juyi, a great poet of the Tang Dynasty, had these poems in the popular "Pipa Line": "Merchants weigh profits and light separation, and the former moon floating beam buys tea." Go to the mouth of the river to guard the empty boat, around the boat Moon Ming River water cold. The poet Wang Jian also has a poem "Watergate makes trouble with the late tea merchants, and the bridge city drinks all night", which reflects the scene of tea merchants being active and trade flourishing.
In the tea house, the flag tea trading account book
Among them, not to mention the lucrative official merchants, according to historical records, many of the private tea sellers who are small businesses alone have become rich in this way, and their capital has accumulated and they have become big tea merchants. And those larger private tea merchants with a certain amount of capital have obtained a lot of profits.
Wang Kejiu, a wealthy merchant in Luoyang, "aged tea in the rivers and lakes, often get rich and return.". In addition, Lü Huang, the father of Lü Yongzhi of Poyang, "sold tea as a business and traveled between Huai and Zhejiang." ...... Huang Mingmin, good at wine law, more with the group business travel." Lü Huang, who was originally a "small people", became rich because of his tea industry and ranked among the great merchants of Guangling.
Long live the tea shop goodbye to the letterhead
Cities also changed with the emergence of tea. Among them, the most prominent is the paradise on earth - Hangzhou.
It is close to the origin of Longjing, and there are hundreds of tea shops and tea houses. Moreover, Hangzhou City is already a metropolis, and there are huge markets to choose from, whether it is self-selling or exporting - this is not unrelated to the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal excavated in the early Sui Dynasty.
West Lake Lonely Mountain Island, a tea house in the autumn moon of Pinghu Lake Photo: Yu Han
When Hangzhou tea was at its peak, there were many tea houses in the city, hundreds of tea houses and tea shops in the city, and tea merchants gathered all over the world.
And Hangzhou is just a microcosm of the Chinese tea industry.
Tea Horse Trail Arch
Not to mention the opening of the Tea Horse Ancient Road, tea is not only transported and traded in the vast markets throughout the north and south, but also entered the tents of the nomadic people in the northwest, and gradually became an indispensable necessity for the ethnic minority people in the frontier to "rely on for their destiny", and the tea and horse mutual market has also become one of the important forms of tea trade in the Song and Ming dynasties.
04. Battle
Tea merchants came with tea farmers and tea leaves, and since a long history, the shopping mall has begun to float and sink.
However, the original owners of these tea leaves seem to have been forgotten by the whole history.
Tea farmers picking tea
When the good tea wind prevailed throughout history, the huge profits made the government a little unable to sit still. The extraction of tea taxes began in the Tang Dynasty, stipulating that the tea-producing states and counties should be taxed on the spot in the tea mountains, and one of the ten teas should be drawn.
Later, the ruling regime of the Tang Dynasty still felt that it was not enough, and implemented the "Tea" law, ordering all the tea gardens in the private sector to be collected and run by the government, and all the tea trees in the private sector were moved to the "official field" or "official roasting", and those that were not moved and merged were to be burned.
For tea farmers who rely on growing tea for a living, this is simply disregarding people's lives. However, they also have no way to rebel directly. But coincidentally, this coincided with the "Ganlu Incident", and the people "complained that Wang Ya was tea, or criticized, or thrown gravel at him." ”
Tea farmer picking tea Photo: Yu Han
When other people saw that the tea monopoly was not feasible, they changed the method, allowing the private sector to operate tea mountains, but extracting heavy taxes from them, and clearly stipulating that no variety of tea was allowed, and it was strictly forbidden to sell and hide tea, and the offenders were severely punished.
Not only in the Tang Dynasty, although the Song Dynasty allowed the people to plant tea trees and operate tea, they routinely extracted "tribute tea" and tea taxes, and also used "tea costs" (that is, disguised usury) to further share profits. In the Southern Song Dynasty, politics was even more corrupt, and tea monopoly was practiced, and it was tea farmers who suffered losses.
It is precisely for this reason that even if the feudal rulers attach importance to and elaborate on "tribute tea" and promote the improvement of roasting technology, tea farmers cannot continue to work, and they cannot grow good tea.
Longjing tea leaves are stir-fried
Under the oppression of the official government, many peasants rebelled because of the harsh exploitation and oppression of the garden households, such as the so-called "Tea Kou" of the Two Lakes in 1171 and the Red Turban Rebellion in Huaixi Mountain Field in 1318 in the Yuan Dynasty, all of which were related to tea production.
It was not until the Ming and Qing dynasties that the development of tea had a subtle improvement, but the good times were not long, and the oppression of the government and tea merchants, as well as the Opium War caused by the trade balance of tea, still caused a sharp decline in tea production, and it was not restored until the founding of New China.
05. History of tea
Tea, in Chinese culture, has always been a symbol of elegance and peace.
However, in the historical turmoil of the past thousand years, the literati have a good name and nobles are looking for treasures, under the wave of conflicts of interest. Tea is always remembered by history for a variety of reasons.
The tea wars have accompanied the history of man. And the history of tea is also wrapped up in the heritage of a civilization.
But even so, tea is still tea.
It is not as strong as wine, nor is it more laborious than the more laborious piano and chess painting.
Tender tea buds in spring
It is born by the first spring breeze of the year, and without waiting to grow up, it carries a spring spirit and freshness, which is intercepted by tea farmers from nature.
Only in this world, leave a good tea that is as rich as an orchid, and the lips and teeth are fragrant, and leave it for the tea guests to taste.
bibliography:
Jiang Tianxi. On the Formation and Development of Chinese Tea Culture[J].Journal of Northwest University (Philosophy and Social Sciences Edition), 2006(06):30-32.
GUO Mengliang. History of Chinese Tea[M].Shanxi Ancient Books Publishing House,2003.
Zhuang Wanfang. Essay on the History of Chinese Tea[M].Science Press,1988.
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Copywriter 丨LL
Cartographic Editor 丨LL
The picture comes from the picture provided by the Tea Gas Exhibition of Yilu and the photo network