Shu tea is a general term, including a variety of teas such as: Mengding mountain tea, Ya'an Tibetan tea (black tea), Emei mountain tea, etc., produced in various parts of Sichuan. Based on the mainstream of the Song Dynasty, Beiyuan tribute tea was preferred, especially if it did not belong to the main production area of Tuan tea, Shu tea was really not well-known, and it lacked famous categories and brands.
However, Shu tea, the weight is extremely heavy, and it has left a strong mark in the Song Dynasty!Because, the annual output of tea in the Song Dynasty was nearly 100 million cattiesThe production of Shu tea is slightly more than one-third of the national tea production。Shu tea toSide teaMainly, the main trading objects of tea horses in the Song Dynasty were border ethnic groups such as Tubo, Huifu, Dangxiang, and Baima.
In 1085 AD, as the main battlefield of the border tea trade, the output of Shu tea was about 30 million catties (Song system). 1 catty in the Song Dynasty is equivalent to 1 nowIn 1936, the output of Shu tea was about 35 million catties. Among them, according to the record of "History of the Song Dynasty, Food and Goods", in the ninth year of Song Xiaozong's dry road (1173 AD), there were 23 fields on Lizhou Road in Chengdu Prefecture, with an annual output of 21 million catties of tea.
Even Baume & MercierHuang TingjianIn the poem, they all sighed: "Every time Shu tea enters Zhufan City, Huma often comes from thousands of miles." ”
Tea and horse division in Ya'an, Sichuan.
The tea horse in the Song Dynasty was an important national policy, and the tea horse was dominated by Shu tea.
Tea was an indispensable military material and an important weapon of the country in the Song Dynasty. In the era of cold weapons, war horses meant cavalry and combat effectiveness, and tea was the best bargaining chip to get war horses.
The Song Dynasty had constant wars with the Liao, Western Xia, Jin, and Mongols, and the lack of horse resources, which was the direct cause of the large-scale tea and horse trade in the Song Dynasty. "History of the Song Dynasty: Food and Goods".It is recorded: "At the beginning of the Song Dynasty, the manager of Shu tea, placed the city in the three counties of Yuan (now Zhenyuan, Gansu), Wei (now Pingliang, Gansu), and Deshun (now Longde, Gansu), and took the city of Fanyi's horses."
Shu tea, which once made Bai Ju easy to drool in the Tang Dynasty, rapidly expanded the planting area in the Song Dynasty due to the rapid expansion of the amount of side tea, and became the place where the tea horses of the Song Dynasty carried the peak, thus shining in the annals of history.
Shu tea did not have a resounding brand among the literati of the Song Dynasty, but the history of Song tea must leave a unique position for Shu tea.
Excerpted from "A Brief History of Human Tea", by Brother Xiaoyao.
*From the web.
A selection of original articles by Brother Xiaoyao
1.A blockbuster article in the tea world: "On the Tea Ceremony".
2.Popular science article on tea culture: "Tea".
3.The Holy Land of Tea: Huzhou.
4.Who is the next important agricultural heritage of China?
5.Blockbuster Release: Tea Wars Model!It is expected to be a milestone in the study of international tea culture.
6.Tea is a national strategic force.
7.Su Dongpo, the transcendent life of a generation of prodigies.
8.Su Dongpo's attitude towards life!Wonderful interpretation of the famous tea poem "Wangjiangnan, Transcendent Taiwan".
9.Zhang Dai, the first genius in the late Ming Dynasty, wrote the quiet beauty of drinking tea on an autumn night.
10.The first tea poem through the ages: Lu Tong's "Seven Bowls of Tea Song".
Brother Xiaoyao, a scholar of tea culture. The first batch of four tea books in the "Great Tea" large-scale tea culture book series: "A Brief History of Human Tea", "Ask the Tea Record: A Superstar of Tea History Illuminating Human Civilization", "The Book of Tea Ceremony" (two-in-one version, including "The Core Idea of Tea"), and "The Most Beautiful Tea Poems in History", all have complete copyrights and will be published soon.
A Brief History of Human Tea: The "first book" for tea drinkers around the world. In this book, you can get a glimpse of thousands of years of vast and magical human tea civilization, known as the most popular and historical tea history book. From birth to origin, from development to prosperity, from ordinary drinks to the spiritual world, from extreme to simplified, from weak to global, a glimpse of the great and magnificent history of tea development for thousands of years.
The Book of the Tea Ceremony: The first tea ceremony monograph in history that shows the history of the formation and development of human tea ceremony philosophy in a panoramic way, with a total of more than 150,000 words, including several ancient texts. The book deeply excavates the foundation, prototype, birth, and development of human tea ceremony thought and philosophy, tea ceremony thought and tea aesthetics, and is an original work that deeply explores the essence of tea ceremony philosophy and the connotation of tea ceremony thought at each stage.
"The Most Beautiful Tea Poem in History".: This is a collection of tea poems that includes the world's classic tea poems, with a total of 280,000 words and 700 pages. The book selects the 100 most representative tea poems from more than 10,000 tea poems in the world, including classic tea poems from China, Japan, South Korea, the United Kingdom, the United States and other countries. Each tea poem is annotated, translated, and appreciated, and the background of the creation, the journey of life, and the glorious knowledge of tea culture are explained. And romance and poetry are the unique charm that this collection of tea poems is born with.
"Ask Tea: A Superstar of Tea History Illuminating Human Civilization".: In-depth excavation of the ten shining tea history superstars in the history of human tea, looking for a vivid life process, but also trying to discover the loneliness and exploration in the life of superstars. The book looks for and analyzes the important explorations of historical figures in the field of tea, and tries to tell them from an interesting perspective. Interesting history, interesting exploration.