Tea was discovered earlier in China. Shennong's Classic of Materia Medica, which originated in the Warring States Period, said that in order to find plants that are useful to people, Shennong "encountered 72 poisons every day and removed them with tea." But at that time, it was unknown whether "tea" was tea or grass, but it was a fact that "tea" was first recognized as a medicine. In other words, it first entered people's lives as a drug.
Erya was compiled by people in the early Han Dynasty from the old books of Zhou and Han Dynasties. In the chapter of "Interpretation of Wood", there is "bitter tea", which refers to tea picked from tea trees, because "bitterness" refers to tea trees. In this regard, there is a further explanation in the Book of Tea: "One tea, two tea, three tea (pronounced by classmates), four tea and five tea (pronounced by classmates)". Refers to the tea harvested at different times. The early harvesters were tea, and the late harvesters were tea, tea and tea. But for "Ming", some people say it is the bud of tea, not the tea picked late.
In ancient times, the word "tea" did not specifically refer to "tea". Sometimes it also refers to weeds and wild vegetables. The Book of Songs? In Zheng Feng's Out of the East Gate, there are women in full swing. Although it is in full swing, it is also what I think. "Tea" here refers to weeds with white flowers. A woman's face is like tea, and her beauty is as white as tea. The Book of Songs? The "Gu Feng" in Gu Feng has the following words: "Who says tea is bitter? It is as sweet as water. The banquet is new and faint, like a brother. " "Tea" here refers to wild bitter vegetables. The Book of Songs? The "owl" in Phoenix (pronounced the same as Hong Xiao) includes: "If you are short of money, stroke the tea with your hand", which generally means holding the strip and sliding the other hand to one end to make the attachments on it leave. So is it the tea of woody plants? It's still not a stem. It seems that in the Zhou Dynasty before the Book of Songs was written, tea trees with trees and shrubs had not yet entered the sight of ordinary people, and drinking tea had not yet entered the lives of ordinary people. The meaning of "tea" is mostly limited to weeds and wild vegetables.
According to legend, in the Zhou Dynasty, Bashu, a tea producer, offered tea to King Wu, and Bashu also planted tea in Bawangyuan, but it did not enter the homes of ordinary people. There are written records of drinking tea, such as Bao's "Huayang National Records" and "Tongyue". From the Western Han Dynasty to the Jin Dynasty, due to the development of transportation after Qin unified the whole country, tea from Yunnan and Sichuan entered the Central Plains from the southwest, which was consumed in large quantities by nobles and used as funerary objects. At the same time, tea has also been accepted by some Taoists, hermits and literati, which is used to cultivate spiritual cultivation and stimulate literary thinking. Drinking tea has really become a social atmosphere of people, and it is said that it was not popularized until the Tang Dynasty.
Recently, I read a book "Classic of Chinese Characters in China" (Huayi Publishing House 1999). In the Book of Tea, I said: "China has the word" tea "with the prefix" grass "and a" wooden body "with the word" person "in the middle. This gives the broad meaning of' tea', that is, grass can be used as tea, such as chrysanthemum tea and honeysuckle tea ... wood can also be used as tea, such as olives and longan. Tea is a kind of drink for people, and it is judged by people, so the middle is from people ... ",but this does not involve the real subject of tea-tea tree. In this way, the concept of tea has been infinitely extended, so even licorice, pepper, ginger peel, walnuts, Siraitia grosvenorii and so on, everything that can be drunk has become tea. What is the value of tea? Some of the above herbs and fruits can be used as drinks, but they are by no means tea. Strictly speaking, tea is made from leaves and stems of tea trees, so it can't be called tea.
"Tea Classic" also said that the pronunciation of tea now "is to communicate with different characters. The word "poor work" means not working hard, deliberately grinding sheep, and poor work. When processing tea, you must be patient, just like a sheep mill. " To make tea, you have to twist it, and then dry it at high temperature ... This process is necessary regardless of green tea and black tea, and rubbing words from one hand to the other "is the reason why tea words are given poor sounds". According to the textual research of Yan Shigu (58 1-654), the word "tea" with today's pronunciation existed in the Han Dynasty. Before the sound of this word came into being, how deep did people know about tea, and would the processing technology of tea be so complicated? What was the possibility of considering "poverty" at that time?
Regarding the origin of the word "tea", the Book of Tea says: "Tea refers to the bifurcation of branches, and leaves are the leaves of branches. When picking tea, it is picked with branches and leaves. The shoots are tea (branches) and the leaves are leaves. Together, it is called tea. " This statement seems too far-fetched Tea refers to the leaves picked from tea trees (naturally some have stems), which are processed and clear enough.