Tea is the elixir of life.
– Eisai.
Eisai was known for treating sick people with tea and writing Kissa Yokoji, "Drinking Tea for Health".
Tea seeds were first brought to Japan by Buddhist monks returning from China. In 805 AD, the monk Saicho brought seeds back from Tang Dynasty China, followed by Kukai in 806 AD. Both planted seeds on temple grounds.
However, tea culture remained limited to monks and the nobility for several more centuries, until it was reintroduced more broadly by the Zen priest Eisai in 1191.
Following the traditions of the Tang Dynasty, tea was mostly drunk as a powder, most similar to present-day matcha. And tea was not a beverage to be enjoyed by the commoner. Instead, only nobility, the samurai, and Buddhist monks were able to enjoy it. By the 16th century, the fame of matcha and what we know as the Japanese tea ceremony had spread throughout Japan and had truly become established as a culture.
Nowadays, we can find tea plantations across Japan, with Shizuoka being the largest tea-producing region. Although the first seeds were sown in Kyoto, tea was produced primarily on temple grounds.
During the Kamakura period (1185 -1333), tea became popularized in many ways.
One of these ways was Tocha, a game popular among the samurai class. In this game, men would gather and try to identify a specific region where matcha was grown. Originally, the main purpose was to distinguish Kyoto-grown matcha from matcha grown in other tea regions in Japan. However, as different tea regions began to gain fame among tea connoisseurs, the rules were changed.
During these tea gathering, the samurai were often known to drink anywhere from 10 to 50 cups of tea, getting completely drunk on it.
Not to mention that there were often times sake going around.
Successful participants would often receive expensive jewelry, weapons, and silk as rewards. These tea gamblers came to be known as quite the extravagant bunch... Eventually, tocha was banned, yet its popularity still kept going strong.
Big amounts of matcha were also constantly consumed by Buddhist priests to remain awake during long hours of meditation.
The matcha tea ceremony which is closest to what we know it to be today wasn’t invented until the late 16th century by Sen no Rikyu and was known as wabicha, which emphasizes simplicity.
Today, tea in Japan is quite different from what it used to be. Most importantly, nowadays it can be enjoyed by anyone, and tea is easy to obtain. Although in modern-day culture, the appreciation for quality tea has somewhat subsided. It is easy to find lower-quality bagged green tea and pre-bottled teas at every step. But surprisingly, it is not as easy to find quality stuff. Japan has slowly become a coffee culture, and quality tea is found primarily in more traditional tea houses and among connoisseurs.
This is the first in a series on the history and traditions of tea in Japan.
