Summary
Highlights
Coffee is presented as one of the most complex and valuable legal commodities, second only to oil. It has an immense political, social, and economic impact, providing livelihood for millions globally. The video introduces coffee's historical journey from ancient times to modern civilization, highlighting its role in social, sexual, economic, and political evolution, fostering both the best and worst aspects of human civilization. Annually, 500 billion cups of coffee are consumed worldwide.
The story of coffee begins in the red cherry of a coffee tree. Its origins are in Ethiopia, with the widely known legend of Kaldi the goat herd and his dancing goats. The Ethiopians were the first to gather wild coffee, initially chewing the cherries or grinding beans with fat to make energy bars. Later, they brewed leaves as a tea, and eventually, around the 1400s, discovered roasting the beans to create the black, potent beverage known today. Coffee is deeply ingrained in Ethiopian culture, treated with prestige and celebrated through elaborate, centuries-old coffee ceremonies, primarily Runi by women where the beans are roasted and blessed, and three servings are poured to honor three sheikhs.
Coffee arrived in the Arabian Port of Mocha via traders, leading to its first cultivation in Yemen. The name 'coffee' is believed to derive from the Arabic word 'Kawa,' meaning wine, as it served as a legal substitute for alcohol. Sufis used coffee to stay awake for their devotions, spreading its use through Arab society beyond religious circles. Coffee houses emerged as vital social venues, allowing people from all walks of life to gather, talk, play games, and engage in political discussions, leading to early concerns from authorities about their potential for sedition and revolution. In 1511, the governor of Mecca tried to ban coffee houses, but the Sultan of Cairo, a coffee lover, overturned the ban, increasing coffee's popularity.
As the Turks conquered the Arab world, coffee culture became integrated into their daily lives. Turkish men frequented public coffee houses, while women, forbidden from these establishments, continued domestic rituals, including coffee-ground fortune-telling. The Turks zealously guarded their coffee monopoly by parboiling beans to prevent cultivation elsewhere. However, an Indian named Baba Budan smuggled fertile seeds, enabling coffee growth in India, and later the Dutch acquired seeds to cultivate in their greenhouses and colonies, especially Java, where they enslaved natives for forced labor. By 1683, Mocha and Java beans were highly prized.
Coffee entered Europe during the Siege of Vienna by the Ottoman Turks. A Polish spy, Jerzy Franciszek Kulczycki, recognized bags of unroasted coffee left behind by the fleeing Turks. He opened Vienna's first coffee house, the Blue Bottle, adding sugar and milk to suit European tastes, a practice still common today. Despite its growing popularity, coffee faced resistance in Europe, arriving with negative connotations due to its association with Turkish coffee houses which were perceived as places of vice and effeminacy. Italian priests petitioned Pope Clement VIII to ban it, but the Pope, upon tasting it, approved of the beverage, symbolically 'baptizing' it.
Italy further perfected coffee culture, with cafes like Caffè Florian and Caffè Quadri in Venice becoming iconic social hubs. Composers like Richard Wagner and Giuseppe Verdi worked in these cafes, albeit separately due to social divides. Casanova, a notorious womanizer, frequented these cafes. Italian baristas, particularly in Trieste, mastered the art of espresso and cappuccino. Espresso, a strong and aromatic yet low-caffeine drink, was a Neapolitan invention, developed to make coffee faster. French society also embraced coffee, with Parisian cafes like Café de Flore and Les Deux Magots becoming centers for artists, intellectuals, and revolutionaries, stimulating discussions and debate, moving Europe from an 'alcoholic haze' to alertness. French cafes, like the historic Café Procope, became crucibles for revolutionary ideas, with leaders like Marat planning the French Revolution within their walls.
A Jewish immigrant from Lebanon opened the first coffee house in England in 1652. By 1700, London alone had 2,000 coffee houses, serving as 'penny universities' where people of all classes gathered for intellectual and commercial exchanges. These cafes became critical to London's social and commercial life, spawning businesses like Lloyd's of London and practices like tipping. However, women were largely excluded from these coffee houses, leading to satirical 'Maiden's Complaint' pamphlets linking coffee consumption to male impotence. Eventually, a shift occurred towards tea, which was cheaper, simpler to prepare, and more socially acceptable for women and families. The British East India Company's monopoly on tea from China further solidified tea's dominance, leading England to become a primarily tea-drinking nation by the late 1700s.
While Britain embraced tea, the European continent's coffee consumption soared, and the French sought to expand their trade. Lieutenant Gabriel de Clieu, by charming a royal mistress, obtained a single coffee seedling from France. He meticulously transported and protected it during a treacherous voyage to Martinique. This single plant became the progenitor of most coffee grown in Latin America. However, this expansion spurred colonialism and slavery; French plantations in Saint-Domingue (Haiti) produced half the world's coffee by 1790, under brutal conditions. In 1791, enslaved people revolted, destroying coffee and sugar plantations in a successful, yet ultimately devastating, struggle for independence. The ironic connection between the French Revolution, planned in coffee houses, and the slave revolt highlights coffee's dual role in fostering both freedom and oppression globally. Coffee continues to bring both pleasure and pain, transforming economies, ecologies, and politics across the Americas.