10 ADDICTIVE FACTS ABOUT COFFEE

1. According to legend, coffee was discovered in the 9th century when an Ethiopian goat herder named Khaldi noticed that his normally lethargic goats were more excitable after they had nibbled the red berries from an evergreen tree. Khaldi took the berries to a Muslim holy man, who turned the raw fruit of the coffee tree into the delicious beverage. [1]

2. Coffee was originally regarded as a wonder drug in Yemen and Arabia and was taken only at the advice of a doctor. Many saw coffee as a brain tonic or as a way to stimulate religious visions.[2]

3. Arabs were the first to cultivate coffee trees on the Arabian Peninsula. Arabs typically roasted and boiled coffee, or qahwa, which is Arabic for “the wine of Islam.”[3]

4. The world’s first coffee house opened in 1475 in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul).[4]

5. When Khair Bey, the governor of Mecca, banned coffee in 1511 because he feared it might encourage resistance to his rule, the sultan executed him on the grounds that coffee was actually “blessed.” [1]

6. Coffee was imported from Arabia to Europe through Venice in the 1600s. While some monks urged Pope Clemente VIII to outlaw the “Muslim” drink, the pope argued that the drink was so good that it would be a “sin” to let only “pagans drink it.” Coffee thus began to spread across Europe.[1]

Megerdich Jivanian (from Thomas Allom) - A Coffee House in Tophane -

7. The Arabs discovered coffee, but were jealous of their discovery and refused to allow fertile coffee seeds to leave their country. However a 17th-century Muslim pilgrim, Baba Budan, smuggled seven seeds out of Arabia and planted them in India. It is said that all the world’s coffee came from these seven seeds.[5]

8. Coffee was banned three times in three different cultures: once in Mecca in the 16th century, once when Charles II in Europe banned the drink in an attempt to quiet an ongoing revolution, and once when Frederick the Great banned coffee in Germany in 1677 because he was concerned people were spending too much money on the drink.[1]

9. The Turks call their coffee houses “schools for the wise.”[4]

10. The word “coffee” is from the Arabic qahwah, which is thought to have meant “wine.” The Turkish word for coffee, kahve, is derived from the Arabic word and is related to the word cafe. [4]

1.       Lorenzettie, Daniel and Linda Rice Lorenzettie. The Birth of Coffee. New York, NY: Clarkson Potter Publishers, 2000

2.      Davids, Kenneth. Home Coffee Roasting: Romance and Revival. New York, NY: St. Martin's Press, 1996.  

3.      Knox, Kevin and Julie Sheldon Huffaker. Coffee Basics: A Quick and Easy Guide. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc, 1997.

4.      La Dolce Vita. Coffee. London, UK: New Holland Books, 1999.

5.      Kostigen, Thomas M. "Everything You Know about Water Conservation Is Wrong." Discover Magazine.  May 28, 2008. Accessed July 22, 2012. 

(from Celeste Hurst @ factretriever)