After what feels like years of doing very little and months’ of writers block, I have decided to write about something that I love; something that I simply cannot start my day without. Coffee.
It is true what people say; by the time you have drunk a few thousand cups of it, you cannot live without it. I represent a large majority of people who simply cannot function without a LARGE cup of coffee in the morning: If you walk down any high street in the UK, you’ll pass at least four coffee shops, packed full of people chatting, catching up with friends or enjoying the simple pleasure that a cappuccino can bring (once the pandemic is over of course). British society has been transformed by coffee and the culture of coffee drinking.
But, where did this drink come from and how has it become such an integral part of British society?
Coffee was the new and exotic commodity to enter England in the seventeenth century. It came from the middle east and received a rather successful reception in England from those in high society. Its initial appeal was that it presented as novel and exotic and thus highly fashionable!
The pressure on those in high court circles to overtly over spend on luxury items to conspicuously display their social status made coffee a most sought after commodity. Through mass consumption, the middling urbanities also purchased it as a luxury commodity to emulate their social superiors. In one way or another, coffee was the most sought after drink in the seventeenth century.
The first description of coffee drinking and the social rituals surrounding it, is in the writings about the Ottoman Empire. The description reads:
‘The Turks have a very good drink, by them called Chaube (coffee) that is almost as black as ink and very good in illness chiefly of the stomach.’
Comparisons were continuously drawn between the ritual of coffee consumption by the Turks and the alcohol centred rituals in the taverns and alehouses of England. The early English coffeehouses were in fact referred to as ‘Turkish Alehouses’.
‘Turks in their coffee houses much resemble our tavern… will labour all day long to be drunk at night in a tippling feast.’
The other great appeal of coffee was that it could be drunk in a public setting in a manner akin to alcoholic beverages but could be consumed without fear of intoxication! It had the appeal of beer without the fearful association of unreasonable illicit sexuality that tainted the other sociable pastimes involving alcohol and drugs. Coffee drinking was associated with a more sober and civil conduct; the behaviour expected of the elite and middling classes in England.
The rise of the Coffeehouse
The coffeehouse was a place where people gathered together to drink coffee, learn the news of the day, meet with other local residents and discuss matters of politics and society.
The first English coffee house was opened in 1650 in Oxford. Two years later in 1652, the first London coffee house opened in Cornhill. By 1700, there were over 2000 coffeehouses in the city! Clearly we aren’t the only generation who like their fix of coffee…
The coffee house of the period was no more than a room in a larger domestic house. The occasional house offered several rooms to their customers and even private rooms for their ‘special customers’. Much like the Turkish coffeehouse, these public spaces also employed young boys working as shoe shiners or as porters for hire on the premises!
The head of the household would run the coffee house either a man, a widow or a single woman, and would be found at the end of the room serving coffee to customers behind the bar. From the picture shown below, you can see a single female serving coffee to customers with the coffee pot warming in front of the fire.
Drawing of a Coffee House (Anonymous, 1690-1700) ©British Museum
The coffee house played a vital role in politics. In the coffeehouse, everyone had access to a newspaper and pamphlet and could participate in political discussion. A model of new ideas of politics and new patterns of social interaction and economic behaviour were set as a consequence. For the first time, people could actively debate and converse in the topics of the age! Access for all offered a revolutionary moment in political history. Everyone could now become a statesman! Coffee houses became a setting for intellectual life, in which public opinion could vent itself around a table and across a coffee cup. Two pennies was the price of three hours debate and discussion!
Seventeenth Century Coffee Recipe:
25 grams of ground coffee beans
¾ pint of water
This coffee was then occasionally added to milk- to get ‘milk coffee’ and sugar, a custom that became increasingly popular over the seventeenth century.
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