The first documented reference to tea came in 350 A.D. when Chinese scholar Kuo P’o wrote about “k’ut’u”, a medicinal beverage “made from the leaves by boiling”. By the fifth century A.D., tea became a major bartering tool for China.
It also became a popular social custom for China’s elite, with the Imperial House and Buddhist priests enjoying royal blends and coveting a special “white” tea, considered the rarest and most delicate of teas.
The original site of tea cultivation has been debated for years, but it’s generally agreed that the first tea garden was in the monsoon region of Southeast Asia, then unclaimed by any nation, and now lying in an area that includes both China and India.

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