The history of coffee is bathed in mystery and myth, strange stories of dark men crouching over hot fires, concocting strong brews that bring dull minds to life and excitement to otherwise motionless limbs.  Unlike the myths surrounding the tea plant, which are many and varied, most coffee experts will go first to a familiar coffee icon, Kaldi, the dancing goat herder.

Kaldi did not always dance, but was rather a responsible goat herder, tending his flock with a paternal care.  Grazing in the mountains of ancient Ethiopia by day, the goats would return home weary each night.  One night the goats failed to return and the next day Kaldi was forced to search for them.  He finally found them frolicking in a small

mystery and myth, strange stories of dark men crouching over hot fires

meadow, dancing on hind feet and butting each other in ecstatic glee.  Mystified, Kaldi found himself watching as the goats nibbled on some bright cherries from several nearby trees.  Kaldi carefully sampled a cherry himself and noticed an odd sensation working through his body.  His eyes opened wider, his weariness seemed abated, and soon he too was dancing with his herd of goats with seeming boundless energy!  A passing monk watched the events for several minutes before approaching Kaldi and determining the cause of such excitement.  Driven by professional zeal, the monk soon found a preparation involving parching and boiling the beans that served to revive his fellow monks in prayer as a large bowl of hot brew was passed during night vigils.  Word soon spread and coffee culture found its roots.

While Europeans first found coffee in Yemen, botanical evidence seems to indicate that it did indeed originate on the high plateaus of central Ethiopia, where it can still be found growing wild.  Coffee culture grew fast on the Arabian Peninsula as coffee developed from a medicine to a religious concoction to the preferred brew of the masses.  Though protective of their economic asset, a canny pilgrim from India, one Baba Budan, was able to smuggle seven coffee beans back to his home country.  When the Dutch came to India in the beginning of the 18th century, they brought seedlings to Java.  Soon all coffee imports to Europe were either from the port of Mocha in Yemen, or from Java.  When combined, these two coffees - at that point the only two coffees available in the world to Europeans - became the now famous blend Mocha Java.

A drink for the rich, King Louis XIV was given a precious gift by the Dutch, a coffee tree.  A special greenhouse was built to house the gift, which was protected with a vigilance seldom given to plants.    Despite such precautions, an enterprising and patriotic Frenchman, Gabriel Mathieu de Clieu, managed by art and intrigue to secure several seedlings and departed for the small island of Martinique in the Caribbean in 1720.  Overcoming the hardship of sea voyage to the point of sharing his water ration with his plant, de Clieu is responsible for the development of coffee in much of the Caribbean and Central America.

Full of mystery and intrigue, Coffee has become the second highest traded commodity in the world, coming in under petroleum production.  The detailed history is fascinating, recording lives lost, fortunes made, and valor displayed.  Pouring coffee into a cup is also a pouring out of that history, that culture, and to taste your coffee is to taste the current summation of all that has come before.  Be sure that the coffee you drink gives a beautiful testimony.