In the autumn of the 22nd year of Zhenguan (648), the first group of "sugar envoys" in ancient China set off from Chang'an to Tianzhu Kingdom, and their mission was to learn the Indian method of boiling sugar.
The starting point of this story can be traced back to a few months ago, when Wang Xuance, the commander of Huangshui County, Rongzhou, encountered local civil strife during his mission to Tianzhu, and the delegation was attacked by the usurper of Tianzhu State, Alonashun, and the personnel and property were destroyed, and only Wang Xuance escaped.
He then brought reinforcements from Tibet, and with his own courage, he turned the tide and defeated Alonashun. Among the captives who returned to the Tang Dynasty, in addition to Alona Shun and the Tianzhu monk Na Suo Po Mei, there was also a group of Indian craftsmen who were good at making "stone honey".
When they met Tang Taizong, they offered the "stone honey" they carried with them to win the favor of the Tang Emperor of Dongtu. Stone honey is actually a sugar cube made by Indians from sugar cane juice.
Although there is no record of Tang Taizong eating sugar in the history books, another historical material reflects his obsession with this taste from the side: "Send an envoy to Magadha (Tianzhu) to take the sugar boiling method, that is, Zhaoyangzhou's cane, squeeze it like its agent, and the color and taste are farther than the Western Regions." ”
Due to Tang Taizong's fascination with sweet taste and function, he sent a group of "sugar envoys" to learn how to boil sugar, which inadvertently promoted the development of China's sugar industry.
In fact, the Chinese's memory of sugar and sugar cane predates the time of Emperor Taizong of Tang. According to Mr. Zhou Keyong, a famous sugarcane scientist, the earliest history of sugarcane cultivation in Chinese began in the early Spring and Autumn period.
At that time, the state of Chu did not accept the king, and once annexed the primitive tribes such as Hufang, Jingchu, and Yangyue, and developed and became the overlord of the south. Sugarcane was one of the main sources of energy used by these tribesmen to replenish their bodies.
With the unification of the south by the Chu State, these areas also became the main sugarcane cultivation bases of the Chu State. The sugarcane produced every year was purchased by the Chu government, either as a mountain delicacy or as a tribute, and flowed into the palace of the king of Chu, and then imported into the Central Plains, establishing the early impression of sweetness at that time.
Although the ancients had a demand for raw sugarcane for a long time, they did not regard the production of sugarcane as the development direction of the sugarcane industry at the beginning. It was not until the Chu royal family used sugarcane in large quantities as a court fruit and vegetable that the planting area of sugarcane continued to expand and the output continued to increase.
After a large amount of sugarcane was produced, juice extraction gradually replaced raw gnawing, and the ancients called virgin sugarcane juice "syrup". Qu Yuan, a Chu person, wrote in "Chu Ci and Summoning Spirits": "The turtle cannon lamb has some syrup. ”
Meaning, the people of Chu like to eat freshly baked lamb or stewed soft-shelled turtle with freshly virgin sugarcane juice at banquets.
Although fresh sugarcane juice is sweet, it is not easy to store and is prone to sour and smelly. The ancients used the method of heating and concentration to prolong the storage time, and the sugarcane juice was heated and evaporated, and gradually turned into viscous sucrose.
Although sucrose has appeared in the Han Dynasty, people still love the original flavor of sugarcane, and the Eastern Jin Dynasty painter Gu Kaizhi invented a unique way to eat sugarcane, he said that life is like eating sugarcane, only by eating upside down, can you slowly taste the taste of sugarcane.
Gu Kaizhi, the master of the Eastern Jin Dynasty painting circle, was famous for Danqing, and the Liang Dynasty also had two sugarcane masters during the Northern and Southern Dynasties, namely Yifeng Hou Xiao Xun and Yicheng Hou Yuxin. When Xiao Xun faced a local rebellion, he ordered his subordinates to pay tribute to sugar cane and gnaw it in front of the whole army, showing a fearless heroic spirit.
After eating the sugar cane, he opened the gates of the city, braved the arrows and stones, and successfully repelled the enemy army, leaving a story for the ages. 3.And Yicheng Hou Yuxin was thirsty due to nervousness when he was facing the army of Hou Jing, the "Great General of the Universe", so he asked his subordinates to send sugar cane to quench his thirst.
However, when he took the sugar cane, Hou Jing's dark arrow hit the gate of Jiankang City, and Yu Xin was so frightened that he ran away, becoming a laughing stock for the ages.
Guangzhou, the starting point of China's ancient maritime Silk Road, has countless Hu merchants coming here every year to carry out ** activities. It was during this period that sugar flowed from China to the world through the hands of these merchants.
The emergence of granulated sugar undoubtedly marks the progress of China's sugar industry. However, the granulated sugar in the primitive stage also has some disadvantages, such as a sour taste, yellowish appearance, and easy to get damp and mildew.
India is a famous sugarcane producer in the world, as early as the 4th century B.C., the local people used the principle of liquid evaporation to produce a unique taste of "jaggery".
It is said that the Buddha Shakyamuni is a descendant of the king of sugar cane in Hindu mythology. During his hunger strike, he came across a glass of sugar cane juice, which inspired him to stop his hunger strike.
This theme has been widely absorbed into Buddhist teachings, and Indians are full of respect for sugar cane while reminiscing about Shakyamuni's preaching and generosity. With the widespread spread of Buddhism in India, sugarcane and its derivatives "jaggery sugar" and "granulated sugar" have gradually formed a sacred medical industry chain in the local area.
The Buddhist monasteries in India have the function of curing diseases and saving people, and the sugar cane, which is closely related to Buddhism, is a good prescription for the monks of that era who are familiar with medical principles. In the 4th-century Indian surgical book "Anecdotes", the author put forward the following opinion: "Sugar cane has a sweet taste, aids digestion, is thick and cool, and has the functions of relieving pain, increasing physical strength, making ** and diuretic."
So to alleviate the pain, it is necessary to use granulated sugar, guda, molasses and other sucrose products to ** various diseases. This kind of home remedies was later included in the "Brahmin Prescriptions", which were introduced to China through Buddhist exchanges in the Sui and Tang dynasties, and were repeatedly recorded in medical documents in the Sui and Tang dynasties.
The original jaggery in India may have been similar to the brown sugar of the present. Although historians have not been able to confirm the influence of the "Brahmin prescription" on Chinese traditional medicine, it can be speculated that Tang Taizong's envoy to ask for "sugar" may have something to do with it.
After all, as an emperor in history who had a fanatical pursuit of immortality, Tang Taizong paid more attention to the medicinal effects of Indian "stone honey". In May of the twenty-third year of Zhenguan (649), the "Divine Pill" refined by the Indian monk Na Suo Po Mei had just been completed, and Tang Taizong couldn't wait to swallow one.
Soon after, he died of "overheating". When Tang Taizong died, the "sugar envoy" had not returned, and India's sugar boiling technology had not been introduced to China. One has no way of knowing why Indian "stone honey" is more delicious than Chinese "granulated sugar".
It was not until ten years after the death of Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, that is, in the fourth year of the reign of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty (659), that an imperial pharmacopoeia called the Xinxiu Materia Medica finally revealed the secret of the Indians' production of sucrose.
It turns out that when Indians make stone honey, they will mix milk, rice flour and sugar to boil, and the final stone honey is actually more similar to the now popular "white rabbit milk candy".
It's no wonder that Tang Taizong liked this unique taste so much during his lifetime.
As an important figure in history, Tang Taizong's hobbies in life have also attracted much attention. One of them is a love of sugar. According to the "New Revision of Materia Medica", since the Indian sugar boiling method was introduced into the Tang Dynasty, sugar workshops in various places began to apply what they have learned.
After Wang Xuance and his entourage returned to the Tang Dynasty, various places have been able to produce "granulated sugar" with local characteristics. According to the "Dietary Therapy Materia Medica", the quality of stone honey is better than that of the finished products of previous dynasties.
This has also led some literati and doctors to insist that there is no sugar in China. However, although sugar with the color of the Silk Road is not cheap in the Central Plains, during the Zhenguan period of the Tang Dynasty, a pound of sugar can still be exchanged for 1 stone of rice.
Even in the era of Tang Xuanzong, the ** of sugar was still high. Despite this, the high price of sugar** did not hinder the ancients' pursuit of sweetness. With the advancement of ancient sugar making technology, by the Song Dynasty in the 12th century, various sugar foods began to become popular.
Not only is sucrose delicious, but it also has preservative properties, and if used to pickle fruit, it can also mask overly acidic or overripe fruit. In the writings of some literati who pay attention to healthy diet, sugar food is praised as "the meaning of purity".
At the same time, sugarcane cultivation and hybridization technology have been promoted in the southern region, which has also contributed to the prosperity of the market economy. During the Song and Yuan dynasties, the quality of sugar was further improved, and frosting was introduced.
In the Southern Song Dynasty's "Frosting Spectrum", the author Wang Zhuo said that frosting was one of the best sugars at that time. In general, sugar was not only a delicious food but also a symbol of economic development in the history of the Tang Dynasty to the Song and Yuan dynasties.
China's earliest sugarcane sugar monograph "Frosting Spectrum". It is said that during the Yuan Dynasty, Marco Polo saw a large number of delicate and white icing in Fuzhou, and recorded this discovery, describing the busyness of the port of Fuzhou**.
However, there was a big difference between the icing sugar at that time and the modern form of white sugar, and it was not until the invention of the yellow mud method that there was real white sugar. In Marco Polo's travels, we have already seen the business opportunities of sucrose**.
With the development of purification technology in the Ming and Qing dynasties and the advent of the Age of Discovery, China's sugar, tea and silk and other materials will inevitably trigger a new round of global ** wave. The history of cane sugar dates back to the time of Alexander the Great's crusades, but it would take a thousand years for the sugar he brought back to be consumed in Europe.
At the end of the 11th century, during the First European Crusade, English knights saw Indian "jaggery" in Jerusalem. This sugar, which came from the East, was later widely sold in Europe and was advertised by merchants as a sacred relic for God's salvation of the Crusaders.
This relevance quickly gained traction, making "high-sugar" foods an important part of the European diet.
During the Ming Dynasty, China's sucrose production technology was quite advanced, and there were many kinds of white sugar produced in Guangdong Province, including pure white sugar, onion sugar, fragrant sugar and other desserts omnivorous.
In order to obtain more sugar resources, the Dutch invaded Taiwan in 1624 and made Taiwan the largest overseas sugar base in Europe at that time. Data show that during the 38 years of the Dutch occupation of Taiwan, Taiwan's total annual sugar output was about 2 million catties, except for one-third of which was shipped to Japan for sale, most of the "Taiwan sugar" was resold to the Persian Gulf, becoming the most profitable case for Europeans in the Middle East.
At the same time, the Portuguese established a sugar production base in Brazil, supplying Europe with 45 million pounds of sugar per year. China's sugar production increased with the demand of the world market, and until the end of the 19th century, sugar ranked third among China's export commodities after tea and silk.
In addition, with the implementation of the maritime ban policy in the Ming and Qing dynasties, Guangzhou, which had a developed sugar industry, once became the only officially recognized foreign port. When many overseas commodities flow through Guangzhou into China, cane sugar plays an important role as a hedge for goods, providing an important boost to the relative balance of foreign trade.
Even if the Qing Dynasty later opened the country and foreign capital invaded due to the two Opium Wars, China's sugar exports still occupy an important position in the world. Before the First Sino-Japanese War, China, along with Cuba, India, Java (present-day Indonesia), and the Philippines, was known as the world's top sugar producer.
The rise of sugar beet sugar in the early 19th century marked the decline of sugar cane as a sugar crop. Western countries have developed their own sugar beet industries by introducing sugar beets.
In contrast, China's sugarcane sugar industry is gradually declining, and the traditional sugar industry is facing serious difficulties under the impact of mechanization. In order to survive, many people had to leave their homes and go out to work.
However, even in a developed country like the United Kingdom, sugar remained a luxury rather than a necessity in the mid-19th century. This provided business opportunities for Western colonizers, who made huge profits by "selling piglets" overseas to engage in slave-like labor.
Since the end of the 19th century, millions of Chinese laborers in Nanyang have been trafficked into sugar workers. In order to produce whiter sugar, the colonists added animal bone residue and even Chinese workers' ashes to the white sugar refining process.
This worldwide human trafficking has caused tragedy for countless families, whose loved ones have died in a foreign land and have never been heard from again. Behind the sweetness lies such a cruel essence, we should remember this history and cherish the hard-won peace and prosperity.