In Yunnan's Xishuangbanna, throughout the year mists permeate the unspoiled mountains. Pu'er tea plants are the little treasures nourished in this piece of earth.

According to local surveys of Yunnan, almost any kind of tea grown throughout the world can also be found in Yunnan. Among these there are also more than a few varieties unique to Yunnan. Besides this, Juan I-ming, director of Taiwan Tea Experimental Station, reports that these old wild tea plants with a thousand years of history have been discovered in Yunnan one after the other. This is strong evidence that Yunnan is indeed the "birthplace of tea."

Growing to a height of almost 12 meters, the ancient tea tree found in Bangwei Village, in Yunnan's Lancang County, is a rare variety that lies half way between wild and cultivated. Already it has triggered enthusiastic talk in the academic world. （photo courtesy of Ch ou Yu）

A tea with history:

The name "Pu'er" holds the same abundant appeal as of old.

Situated in the southern part of Yunnan Province, Pu'er Township (in ancient times known as Pu'er Prefecture) from early in the Tang Dynasty onward, was Yunnan's commercial tea center. The Tibetans, Mongolians and other ethnic minorities from the northwest, brought horses for barter. They traded horses for tea, forming the famous "tea-horse trade." Other teas, sold in Thailand and Burma to the south or shipped to the northern capitals, all would pass through Pu'er.

The broad definition of Pu'er tea is any kind of Yunnan tea leaves traded in this area. The method of their production may be quite different; each is different in appearance. Take for example simple Chingmao tea, hung to dry in the sun. Or consider the many kinds of tea that are made from Chingmao leaves after they have been steamed soft and tightly compressed. There are many examples: bowl shaped Tuo tea; square tea bricks; tea cakes, which are beaten into a circular shape; and many others. Altogether, the number of varieties exceeds one hundred.

Pu'er tea is compressed into all sorts of shapes, and its appearance is different from all other kinds of Chinese loose tea. This is actually because in the age when roads were crude, passing from Yunnan to Tibet required traveling uphill for two or three months. Therefore, they compressed the tea to reduce its volume and facilitate transport.

Pu'er tea was marketed along the frontiers, because the great deserts did not produce fruits or vegetables. For the ethnic minorities, who ate meat year after year, tea served to dispel fat, calm hot vapors, and replenish vitamin C. Tibetan butter tea and Mongolian milk tea are both brewed with the Pu'er leaf. The Han people seized the advantage this afforded. Because of this, throughout history there was a policy of "controlling the barbarians with tea." If the ethnic minorities were unwilling to be subjugated, the Han would not sell them tea.

The legend of Kung Ming, grandfather of tea:

Interestingly, most of the great discoveries of history are accidental; and so was the discovery that Pu'er tea gets sweeter with age.

Chou Yu, owner of the Wisteria tea house, points out that Yunnan locals really are not themselves in the habit of drinking aged Pu'er. Perhaps, when Yunnan's tea manufacture was still in the early stages of cottage industry, they developed the tradition of "selling the tea that grandfather grew." Later, as more professional tea manufacture developed, it changed into selling the tea as it was produced.

Fresh Pu'er tea is held by the Han people to be "bitter and cold." Nonetheless, the minorities, with their sturdy physiques, usually just roast the leaves slightly, steep the tea and partake. Because of this, people who search the mountainous areas of Yunnan for genuine aged Pu'er are often greatly disappointed.

This being the case, when was it discovered that Pu'er tea gets sweeter with age, and by whom? Was it in the process of transport for market in Tibet, when people discovered that it had fermented after it was exposed to moisture and heat? Or was it discovered by someone who stockpiled it for a long time in his home? How long is the limit for storing Pu'er tea? How long can it actually be stored and still used? Currently, there is so-called "Hundred year tea." Can tea 100 years old still be drunk? There are any number of questions and theories, all difficult to verify; these have become some of Pu'er tea's unanswered riddles.

Many kinds of beautiful legends are connected with the birthplace of tea. For instance, most Chinese tea stores are accustomed to offering sacrifices to the Tang dynasty tea master Lu Yu; in Xishuangbanna, however, the Jinuo and other minorities adulate the historical statesman Kung Ming as the "grandfather of tea."

It is said that when Kung Ming took his armies on a southern campaign, some of his troops espied the bountiful earth of Yunnan and requested him to let them settle there. Kung Ming not only allowed them to do so; he also planted tea there with his own hand, instructing them in the ways of growing tea. Every year thereafter, he sent men back to them, exchanging materials from the interior for the tea they grew.

Up until today every year in July a "grandfather of tea" festival is held on the famous You Le mountain. They set aloft Kung Ming lanterns to commemorate him. Although there are no historical records that Kung Ming ever went to Xishuangbanna, this does not lessen the respect which the people there feel for him.

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Growing to a height of almost 12 meters, the ancient tea tree found in Bangwei Village, in Yunnan's Lancang County, is a rare variety that lies half way between wild and cultivated. Already it has triggered enthusiastic talk in the academic world. (photo courtesy of Chou Yu)