Practical Pu-erh Tea - (The First Pu-erh Tea Book in China with a DVD)

Author: Yang Kai, Liu Yamei, Liu Song, Yang Hongbo
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-05-01
Features: In ancient times, western Yunnan was part of the Tethys Oceanic Ridge structure. It was a vast region where land and sea intermingled, with a warm and humid climate and abundant rainfall. About 50 million years ago, at the time of the dinosaur extinction, seed plants, including the tea plant genus, originated here. With the Himalayan orogeny, the region was compressed and twisted by the Indian Ocean Plate, forming the Sichuan-Yunnan longitudinal valley and the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, which divided many small landforms and microclimates. These small climatic zones not only promoted the development of tea plants but also blocked the invasion of the Quaternary glacier, objectively preserving the ancient and unique resource of large-leaf tea trees.
During the Three Kingdoms period, tea seeds in Nanzhong (now central and western Yunnan and western Guizhou) were already well-known. Fu Xun in the Jin Dynasty's Seven Admonitions ranked them alongside the apples of Dayuan and the rock sugar of India as renowned local products. In the Tang Dynasty, Fan Chuo wrote in The Book of the Barbarians·Section 7 on the Products of Yunnan that, "Tea is produced in the mountains around Yinsheng City. It is collected in small quantities without any cultivation methods. The Mengshe people mix it with pepper, ginger, and cinnamon and drink it." Yinsheng City was built by the Nanzhong king who ruled Yunnan at the time, covering areas now including Yuanjiang, Zhenyuan, Jindong, Lancang, and Xishuangbanna, largely aligning with the main production areas of later Pu-erh tea.
In the Tang Dynasty, the Tibetan people rose to prominence in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. The Tang Dynasty adopted a policy of marriage alliances, marrying Princess Wencheng to the Tibetan king Songtsen Gampo, with tea as part of the dowry, thus introducing tea drinking in Tibet. Due to its ability to aid digestion, the caffeine in tea could invigorate the mind, and the tea polyphenols could stimulate saliva production, quenching thirst. Additionally, the vitamin B and vitamin C in tea could supplement the lack of vegetables in the Tibetan region, making tea an indispensable beverage for Tibetans. The Tibetan people did not produce tea and had to trade Tibetan fine horses, medicinal herbs, and musk for it with tea-producing regions. The Tibetan people were fierce warriors and had been a major threat to the central government since their rise in the plateau. Meanwhile, the continuous northern wars required the central government to secure a large number of warhorses. While the Tibetan region was the only place in Yunnan that produced horses, the Dali horses were also quite famous. To obtain good horses at lower prices and use tea as a political commodity to control ethnic minorities in border regions, the central government implemented a monopoly on tea trade, imposing severe penalties, including death, for smuggling.
Each year, the tea-horse agencies in Sichuan and Shaanxi exchanged warhorses with the Tibetans at fixed prices and traded horses (referred to as jimi horses) and other goods with affiliated ethnic minorities at preferential prices. During the Song Dynasty, a tea-horse agency was established in Jingjiang (now Guilin in Guangxi), using tea and silk from Guangdong and Guangxi to trade for warhorses with the Dali Kingdom and the Ziqi Kingdom (the Ziqi warhorses might also have originated from Dali). This shows that Yunnan did not produce tea during the Tang and Song dynasties, even if there was some tea cultivation, it had not yet developed into a commodity. Large quantities of tea from Guangxi entered Yunnan via the Temo Road (now Guangnan in Yunnan) and the Ziqi Kingdom (now Anlong Bui and Miao Autonomous County in Guizhou) into Lake Dian and the Dali region.
Despite many records indicating that the ancestors of Yunnan had intentionally selected, optimized, and domesticated tea trees early on, and that the Pu-erh tea variety had always existed in the plant classification of Yunnan, the concept similar to modern Pu-erh tea had not yet formed until the Yuan Dynasty. The History of the Yuan Dynasty (compiled in 1370) mentioned large-leaf tea but still classified Yunnan as a province that did not produce tea. In the early Ming Dynasty, the tea tax in Yunnan (as recorded in The Ming Imperial Canon, compiled from 1502 to 1587) was 17 taels, 3 coins, 1 fen, and 4 li, also classified as a tea-producing region. However, this situation changed quickly. For Yunnan, the Ming Dynasty was a special period. The influx of large numbers of soldiers for land settlement, the establishment of the floating official system, and extensive contact with the Central Plains accelerated the exchange of materials and production techniques, promoting the advancement of tea processing technology in Yunnan and stimulating widespread social demand, allowing Pu-erh tea to rise rapidly, as stated in The Annals of Yunnan, "All common people use Pu-erh tea."
The "Pu-erh tea" mentioned here should not be disputed as referring to Pu-erh tea. Noting the statement in Liu Wenzheng's Annals of Yunnan: "(From Zhenyuan Prefecture) After traveling two days, you reach the border of the. After two more days, you arrive at Pu'er Mountain in, where tea is produced. Another mountain, Guangshan, is tall and, inhabited by a headman, with the camp of Zhuge Liang from Shu-Han. After two more days, you reach a vast plain, over a thousand miles wide, where elephants are raised, and the mountain is also where Zhuge Liang sent arrows. There is also a stele of Zhuge Liang, covered in moss, with unreadable characters. After four more days, you finally reach the." The "er" in did not have three dots, and Pu'er Mountain was generally believed to be Ximen Mountain on the west side of the Pu'er city.
In the Qing Dynasty's official document Proclamation on the Second Ban on Tea Trade Corruption, it was also stated, "If you are willing to sell Pu-erh tea at a fair price and in full silver, all nearby tea mountains can be bought." Nearby refers to Simao and Pu'er. This shows that Pu-erh tea is indeed Pu-erh tea. Ruan Fu's Record of Pu-erh Tea: "The so-called Pu-erh tea does not come from the jurisdiction of Pu-erh Prefecture but is produced in the Simao Prefecture. The prefecture has six tea mountains: Yibang, Jiabu, Yikeng, Manzhuang, Gedian, and Yiwu." Claiming that Pu-erh does not produce tea and that the name Pu-erh tea originated because Pu-erh Prefecture is a trading hub for Pu-erh tea is inaccurate, at least until the reign of Emperor Yongzheng, Pu-erh tea still included tea from Pu-erh and the surrounding areas of Simao.
During the Ming Dynasty, Pu-erh was still under the rule of. Pu'er Mountain was likely a key route for to reach Jingdong (the tribute road), about six days away from the residence of the. Although the tea of also needed to be exported from Pu'er Mountain, Pu'er Mountain did produce tea at the time, and the name Pu-erh tea thus originated from this mountain.
During the Tianqi era, tea production in Yunnan began to develop rapidly. Due to the increased production of Pu-erh tea, Jingdong Prefecture "increased tea tax by 125 taels" (Liu Wenzheng, Annals of Yunnan, compiled from 1621 to 1627). The central government, noticing the increase in tea production, began to regulate it through taxation. It can be inferred that at that time, tea entering Dianzhong via Jingdong was over 400 dan (with a tax of 3 coins per dan). At the time, since areas like Yuanjiang were still under the rule of other local lords, the roads were not well-developed, and Pu-erh tea could only be transported from Zhenyuan to Jingdong, taxed in Jingdong, and then transported via Dali to sell in Heqing and the Dianzhong area of Kunming.
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