Ya-Ya’s Tea-Board

This is a post I have been planning to write for a long time (I wrote the first part in this mini series about teapots in July last year). One of the reasons this post was such a long time in the making is that the seemingly easy subject of tea cups is quite a daunting one if you start going into any depth beyond the obvious definitions. But let’s start with a basic definition and look at the cultural differences afterward. A tea cup could be universally described as a vessel used to hold tea.

Of course, we all know that and to most people (and Wikipedia for that matter), a tea cup is usually characterized by having a handle, a certain size, is made from a certain material and is used by one person. But this is a very Western view point and with this post, I’m attempting to shed some light on tea cups from other cultures.

China

Being the home country of tea, China has a very long tradition of specialized teaware, cups included. Originally, tea was most likely drunk out of common bowls that functioned as multi-use containers, used for food and drink. The oldest specialized tea equipment, including tea cups, were discovered by archaeologists in ShangYu, ZheJiang Province in China and date back to the Later Han Dynasty (25-220 AD). By this time, tea had lost its status as an obscure drink and was consumed more widely, inspiring the creation of specialized equipment. These earliest pieces were made of porcelain, an industry that was to be developed greatly in the following centuries.

During the Tang (618-907 AD) to Song (960-1279 AD) Dynasties, tea went through its first first major phase of refinement and innovation (this period is often referred to as the golden age of tea). But during that time, tea was still consumed as a powder stirred into water (much like Japanese matcha today) and the teacups were bowls instead of the small cups we see today.
The big change to infusing whole tea leaves instead of tea powder happened in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644 AD) and caused a wave of innovation. Proper tea pots as we know them today were developed and also the small gong fu tea cups. These thimble-sized, handle-less sipping cups (cha bei) were popularized to serve tea poured from small tea pots. In the late Ming Dynasty, Zisha (purple clay, or better known as Yixing after its place of origin) pottery was introduced and its reputation as the best material for tea preparation has persisted until today. During the following Qing Dynasty (1644-1912 AD), teaware was constantly refined and shaped into what we know today. While the gaiwan was probably developed in the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD), it was not until the Qing Dynasty that it gained wide popularity amongst tea drinkers.

Japan

In the first centuries of tea consumption in Japan (tea plants were brought to Japan from China in 1191 AD by the monk Esai), tea ware imported from China was used as a status symbol by lords and samurai. It wasn’t until the 16^th century and the teachings of Takeno Joo and Sen no Rikyu that the formal Japanese tea ceremony (chanoyu) was developed. It replaced the Chinese teaware with Japanese pottery that emphasized simplicity and wabi. The ceremonial tea cup for chanoyu is the chawan, or tea bowl. A chawan is a relatively large bowl that is used to whisk the tea powder (matcha) into the hot water. It is then passed around for everyone to drink the tea out of the same bowl.

Apart from the very specialized chawan, there are tea cups for ‘common’ tea, i.e. everyday use. These teacups are called yunomi (literally ‘for drinking hot water’) and come in a vast variety of shapes, materials and colours. Yunomi are some of the most attractive tea cups in the world. The range of styles is incredible, from ceramic cups with manga scenes to hand-crafted stoneware cups with elaborate glazes - there is a yunomi to suit anyone’s taste. A famous glaze is called gohonte and is created by mixing different colours prior to firing that produce pale pink spots resembling an aquarelle painting.
Yunomi are generally roughly cylindrical and higher than they are wide. But exceptions exist and you can sometimes find almost round yunomi. A yunomi is used for any kind of green tea that doesn’t come from a tea powder (i.e. for sencha, houjicha, etc.). The invention of yumoni is probably connected to the development of leaf green tea in the Edo period (1600-1867 AD) which necessitated a cup different from the existing tea bowls. Since yunomi don’t have a handle like Western-style cups, a combination of design and proper handling is used to avoid burning the fingers of tea drinkers. Yunomi should never be filled to the rim (which is often shaped slightly flaring) but rather to about a good finger width below. You can then grab the cup at the rim between index finger and thumb and use the little finger against the foot of the cup and hold the cup comfortably.
There are special pairs of yunomi called meoto yunomi (meoto means ‘married couple’). Meoto yunomi usually consist of two cups with the same pattern (sometimes in different colours) but different sizes and often slightly different shapes (the larger cup being the ‘husband’ and the smaller being the ‘wife’ cup). See the picture at the top of this post for an example of meoto yunomi.

Taiwan (Formosa)

Taiwan plays a special role in the world of tea cups. While tea has been cultivated in Taiwan since the 19^th century, it was originally mainly produced for export to Britain and Japan (during the Japanese occupation from 1895-1945). In the 1960s and early 1970s, most Taiwanese drank imported tea from China. Since the population was generally poor, the same bowl was used to drink cheap imported tea and eat rice from.
But at the height of Taiwanese tea exports during the mid-1970s, the tea industry in Taiwan began to grasp the importance of a local tea market. The timing was right since it happened during a time of strong economic growth which afforded the society with disposable income. The first tea houses were opened and a very fast development defining a ‘Taiwanese tea culture’ took place. While this culture followed the sophisticated tea rituals of mainland China fairly closely, it spawned one invention that revolutionized tea appreciation worldwide: the smelling or aroma cup (wen xiang bei). While there are no reliable sources about who invented the smelling cup, there are records of smelling cups being in use by the mid-1980s at the latest.
It doesn’t really come as a surprise that the aroma cup was invented in Taiwan. Taiwanese oolongs are famous for their aroma and the aroma cups are the perfect vehicle to appreciate it; they allow a separation of the pure aroma from the flavour of a tea which is always a mixture of aroma and taste.
When the tea is poured, it is first poured into the aroma cup (which usually has a cylindrical shape, sometimes with a flaring rim). The sipping cup (cha bei) is then placed onto the aroma cup upside-down ( which results in something resembling a mushroom), picked up with index finger and thumb and shaken. Then, both cups are turned so that the sipping cup now faces right-side-up. The aroma cup is slowly lifted and the tea is poured into the sipping cup. Then, the empty aroma cup is used to inhale the aroma of the tea. The aroma of tea changes while the aroma cup is cooling and an experienced tea drinker can infer the quality of a tea by the changes in aroma during the cooling process.

As you can see, traditions around such a basic item as a tea cup vary considerably around the world. I hope I managed to add a little to your understanding of these cultures. I personally get more enjoyment out of my tea rituals if I know the origins and details of them. And I prefer to drink a Chinese oolong out of a cha bei and a Japanese green tea out of a beautiful yunomi. Please feel welcome to ask any questions that you might have in the comments below.

For a selection of our broad range of tea cups, please have a look at our teacup page.