International Tea Day (15 December)

[Ross Clark]

"Many tea-producing countries celebrate their product on this day."
Why this day?
"It was created at the World Social Forum in 2004, and the following
year the first such day was recognized in New Delhi."
But why this day? And what's the World Social Forum?
"In 2015 the Indian Government proposed a global event to the UN Food
and Agriculture Organization, and the first UN Tea Day was celebrated in
2020 on 21 May -- a day chosen because May is the season when harvesting
begins in most tea-producing countries."
"But the December date is still used, and has some significance, as the
famous Boston Tea Party of 1773 -- a major dispute over tea taxation --
took place the next day."
OK, I give up.

"To the office, where Sir W.Batten, Collonell Slingsby, and I sat a
while; and Sir R.Ford coming to us about some business...talked like a
man of great reason and experience. And afterwards did send for a cupp
of tee (a China drink of which I never had drank before)..."
- Samuel Pepys, diary, 25 September 1660

A first for Pepys, and close to the first for English. The earlier
attestations in OED are both from books about China. One (1598) refers
to "warme water made with the powder of a certaine hearbe called Chaa".
The other (1655) says that "Chá is a leafe of a tree...called also Tay".

The first actually implying the use of tea in England is from the same
year as Pepys, a merchant named Thomas Garway announcing that he "hath
Tea to sell from sixteen to fifty shillings the pound".

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

Post by Ross Clark
"Many tea-producing countries celebrate their product on this day."
Why this day?
"It was created at the World Social Forum in 2004, and the following
year the first such day was recognized in New Delhi."
But why this day? And what's the World Social Forum?
"In 2015 the Indian Government proposed a global event to the UN Food
and Agriculture Organization, and the first UN Tea Day was celebrated
in 2020 on 21 May -- a day chosen because May is the season when
harvesting begins in most tea-producing countries."
"But the December date is still used, and has some significance, as the
famous Boston Tea Party of 1773 -- a major dispute over tea taxation --
took place the next day."
OK, I give up.
"To the office, where Sir W.Batten, Collonell Slingsby, and I sat a
while; and Sir R.Ford coming to us about some business...talked like a
man of great reason and experience. And afterwards did send for a cupp
of tee (a China drink of which I never had drank before)..."
- Samuel Pepys, diary, 25 September 1660
A first for Pepys, and close to the first for English. The earlier
attestations in OED are both from books about China. One (1598) refers
to "warme water made with the powder of a certaine hearbe called Chaa".
The other (1655) says that "Chá is a leafe of a tree...called also Tay".

Something that I've found curious is that although many languages
(English, French, German, Spanish etc.) use words similar to "tea",
some (Russian, Portuguese, Chinese etc.) use ones similar to "cha".
(Having said that, English has "char" as a slang word.)

Post by Ross Clark
The first actually implying the use of tea in England is from the same
year as Pepys, a merchant named Thomas Garway announcing that he "hath
Tea to sell from sixteen to fifty shillings the pound".

That sounds very expensive!

[Christian Weisgerber]

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden
Something that I've found curious is that although many languages
(English, French, German, Spanish etc.) use words similar to "tea",
some (Russian, Portuguese, Chinese etc.) use ones similar to "cha".
(Having said that, English has "char" as a slang word.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etymology_of_tea
Nearly all of the words for tea worldwide originate from Chinese
pronunciations of the word 茶, and they fall into three broad groups:
te, cha and chai, present in English as tea, cha or char, and chai. The
earliest of the three to enter English is cha, which came in the 1590s
via the Portuguese, who traded in Macao and picked up the Cantonese
pronunciation of the word. The more common tea form arrived in the
17th century via the Dutch, who acquired it either indirectly from the
Malay teh, or directly from the tê pronunciation in Min Chinese. The
third form chai (meaning "spiced tea") originated from a northern
Chinese pronunciation of cha, which travelled overland to Central Asia
and Persia where it picked up a Persian ending yi, and entered English
via Hindustani in the 20th century.

I've seem a better map I can no longer find, but here's the one
from WALS:
https://wals.info/feature/138A

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

Post by Christian Weisgerber

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden
Something that I've found curious is that although many languages
(English, French, German, Spanish etc.) use words similar to "tea",
some (Russian, Portuguese, Chinese etc.) use ones similar to "cha".
(Having said that, English has "char" as a slang word.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etymology_of_tea
Nearly all of the words for tea worldwide originate from Chinese
te, cha and chai, present in English as tea, cha or char, and chai. The
earliest of the three to enter English is cha, which came in the 1590s
via the Portuguese, who traded in Macao and picked up the Cantonese
pronunciation of the word. The more common tea form arrived in the
17th century via the Dutch, who acquired it either indirectly from the
Malay teh, or directly from the tê pronunciation in Min Chinese. The
third form chai (meaning "spiced tea") originated from a northern
Chinese pronunciation of cha, which travelled overland to Central Asia
and Persia where it picked up a Persian ending yi, and entered English
via Hindustani in the 20th century.
I've seem a better map I can no longer find, but here's the one
https://wals.info/feature/138A

Thanks. Very interesting. I wouldn't have guessed that tea and cha had
a common origin.

Your map is interesting, but as Chile is (or used to be) as much of a
tea-drinking nation as the UK or Russia, I'm surprised there is no
symbol for it. Pablo Neruda was at one time the Chilean consul in
Ceylon. One day he was approached by a British colonial official who
wanted to what they did with all the tea they imported from Ceylon. We
drink it, he said. Incidentally, they call it té, as in peninsular
Spanish.

[Christian Weisgerber]

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden

Post by Christian Weisgerber
I've seem a better map I can no longer find, but here's the one
https://wals.info/feature/138A

Your map is interesting, but as Chile is (or used to be) as much of a
tea-drinking nation as the UK or Russia, I'm surprised there is no
symbol for it.

It's the World Atlas of Language Structures Online. It has large
lists of (mostly more interesting phonological and grammatical)
features and corresponding maps of the languages indigenous to that
part of the world. I guess the compilers didn't have any data for
tea words in a Chilean language, but if they did, it would be for
something like Mapuche rather than Spanish, which is located on the
Iberian peninsula.

You may want to browse a bit in WALS, it's an interesting resource.