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Coffee’s Beginnings In Europe

Paris - St-Germain-des-Prés: Cour du Commerce ...

Image by wallyg via Flickr

Coffee’s gateway into Europe was through Turkey and specifically Constantinople-that-was, or Istanbul. There was a huge amount of trade between Italy and Constantinople and particularly to Venice.

Venetian merchants introduced coffee and made it a luxury item. It was expensive and initially difficult to get. Reportedly Pope Clement VIII blessed coffee as [...]

Early Coffee Growing And Consumption

Coffea arabica trees in Brazil

Image via Wikipedia

One thing is for certain – cultivation of coffee DID begin in Ethiopia and was then spread by the Arabic  world as it expanded rapidly around 1100 AD. From the Arabic world. Coffee was traded into Europe and India. The very first consumption of coffee was in solid form – grinding beans into [...]

The Origins Of Coffee

Shaded relief map of Ethiopia.

Image via Wikipedia

The History Of Coffee

Coffee is everywhere nowadays. Spread by its success as a legal stimulant and by the aggressive marketing of companies like Starbucks, it is pretty hard to find anywhere in the world that doesn’t have ready access to coffee of some sort. But coffee means different things to different people, cultures [...]