Fire Horse Year & Tea Horse Road

 Salvete Omnes,

Chinese zodiac - Fukuoka, Japan

the Lunar year of Fire Horse started on February 19th.  May this new year bring peace and prosperity to all.

Today's post will be about tea, mules and horses.

The Chamadao or Chamagudao or the Ancient Tea Horse Road was the trade route between  Tang China and Tibet and Bengal. 

Along with silk and porcelain the teas of China became quite early essential  commodities for the external markets and coveted Chinese imports. 

For more than a thousand year Chinese caravans of tea-horse (mule) muleteers and porters carried packaged tea from Chengdu in Sichuan & Kunming in Yunnan,  from Pu'er & Dali regions of tea growing and production to the Tibetans of  Lhasa and other centers of power, to the Nepalis further west and to the Bengali yet further to  the southwest, all  across the Himalayan mountains and plateaus. 

Since horses did not breed well in the main Han China provinces, then the Chinese export of tea & silk etc led to the exchange of  those much coveted Tibetan-bred horses  for tea etc. 

Tibetan pony

The Song Dynasty, very poor in good horses for their cavalry due to their wars with the  Jin Dyansty and Mongols, is known for importing the Naqu/Hequ horses from Tibetan breeders.

Hequ horse of Tibet

Hequ horse

Hequ horse

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Teas from the Chinese cultivation areas was harvested by hand, dried, fermented and shaped into bricks and cakes, the final products wrapped in bamboo leaves & husk or tree bark for travel. For six months the tea caravans would trek the road until reaching their desired market destinations. 

The Chinese tea drinking spread to India, Mongolia, Central Asia and Japan, and much later to Muscovy and Europe. 

Valete