When did Japan start drinking tea?

February 22, 2025

When you think "Japan", what are some of the first things that come to your mind?

For me, "tea" is definitely on the list. I remember my first trips to Japan, and how much fun it was to explore the differences of tea in Japan vs how it is in the US.

While exploring, I definitely drank way too much tea on my first trips here.

But I couldn't help it! Vending machines full of plain green tea (no sugar or anything) were everywhere. Each bottle contained a wonderful variety of flavors that I hadn't experienced to that level back in the US, even with the tea I was brewing at home.

And don't get me started on all the tea-flavored snacks I was running into. 京都きょうと (kyouto // Kyoto) was brimming with them. I tried so many.
(Those crunchy 抹茶まっちゃ八やツ橋はし [maccha yatuhashi // matcha yatsuhashi] are my favorite, by the way. Big recommend. 抹茶まっちゃ団子だんご [maccha dango // matcha dango] are also quite good ^^).

Even now that I live here, my tea journey is still ongoing. I still find myself running into new types of tea that I haven't tried yet, and it's been fun.

I've been on a bit of a "Japanese history" journey recently, too. The combination of these got me thinking…

"What's the history of tea in Japan?"

I found a few things that surprised me a lot actually, so let's take a look!

As a quick note, we'll focus on tea from チャノキ (Camellia sinensis), which is the plant that probably pops into your mind when you hear "green tea". While I assume that people might have been making teas from grasses or other things, that's outside of the focus of this newsletter ^^

お茶ちゃ (ocha// tea)

First, check out this guy in the middle:

If you've read the NativShark lessons on the 飛鳥時代あすかじだい (asuka jidai // Asuka Period) and 古墳時代こふんじだい (kofun jidai // Kofun period), he might look familiar. This is 聖徳しょうとく太子たいし (shoutoku taishi // Prince Shōtoku), one of the most famous historical figures in Japan.

If you haven't reached those lessons yet and find the Japanese in them to be a bit difficult, no worries! Once you get there naturally with enough presses of this button, you'll have all the tools you need to understand it ^^

If you haven't started your learning journey yet, you'll need your account first! You can make one for free here:

聖徳しょうとく太子たいし did a lot of notable things, including bringing Buddhism to Japan from China.

Somewhere alongside Buddhism, tea also made its way over from China. One source I found said it was brought over during 聖徳しょうとく太子たいしの時代じだい (shoutoku taishi no jidai // the era of Prince Shōtoku), which I would assume to be when he was alive, so around ~600 CE. About 120 years before Japan started recording its history.

But most other sources I found are more conservative with the date, pointing to records from the early 800s instead.

Either way, when tea first came over, it was a bit different than you might imagine. It seems like 餅茶へいちゃ (heicha) was the norm back then, which is a type of tea that was steamed and hardened into a big clump. Check it out:

Image from e-chinatea.com.

I can't say I've seen this before. It doesn't seem all that common nowadays? The kanji for this word don't even come up when I type へいちゃ, which is usually a good indicator that people don't use this word very often.

By the way, that first kanji, 餅, is the kanji for mochi (rice cakes)! A fun connection. It makes me think that perhaps 餅 was originally used for things that were pounded/smushed together into a clump, and the rice cakes we know today are the only thing that still get processed that way anymore so the meaning of the kanji 餅 evolved a bit. Just my guess, though ^^

Anyway, at first, お茶ちゃ was incredibly valuable and used more medicinally rather than something you'd just drink to enjoy. If you weren't a monk or a noble, you'd probably never have the chance to try it.

Then, around the start of 鎌倉時代かまくらじだい (kamakurajidai // Kamakura period 1185-1333), 抹茶まっちゃ (maccha // matcha) was introduced to Japan (brought over by a Zen monk called 栄西 [えいさい/ようさい] coming back from China). It spread to the 武士階級ぶしかいきゅう (bushi kaikyuu // Samurai class), where it was used as a social tool. Zen monks also found it useful for warding off sleepiness, which got in the way of meditation.

As far as I have been able to figure out, お茶ちゃ was always imported for these first 400~600 years, and not grown directly in Japan.

Likely shortly after the aforementioned 栄西えいさい・ようさい brought over 抹茶まっちゃ to Japan, another monk by the name of 明恵上人みょうえしょうにん (myoue shounin) got some tea from China and began a 茶園ちゃえん (chaen // tea plantation) at 高山寺こうさんじ (kousanji // Kousan temple) in 京都きょうよ (kyouto // Kyoto), which stands to this day as 日本最古にほんさいこの茶園ちゃえん (nihon saiko no chaen // The oldest tea plantation in Japan).

They even have a website 👀

Fast forwarding a bit, お茶ちゃ (ocha // tea) took off among the common people in the 江戸時代えどじだい (edo jidai // the Edo period, 1603-1868). Here's a tidbit I found about it:

Textbook Casual

...抹茶まっちゃではなく、簡単かんたんな製法せいほうで加工かこうした茶葉ちゃばを煎せんじたものを飲のんでいたようだ。

It seems that they didn't drink matcha, but something produced by a simple method of boiling tea leaves.

From 1日1ページ、読むだけで身につく日本の教養365.

I couldn't find out exactly what this would look like, but I'm guessing it wasn't anything we'd be used to drinking today.

By the way, the majority of tea that Japan produces nowadays is 緑茶 (ryokucha // green tea). 煎茶 (sencha) accounts for about 2/3 of that, and the method to produce it was discovered(invented?) during the Edo period. The method for making 玉露 (gyokuro // gyokuro; a high-quality green tea) also came about later during this period.

Be sure to try both of those types whenever you're in Japan! They're quite good ^^

伊右衛門いえもん (iemon)

伊右衛門 is a popular brand of bottled tea you'll find here, which you can find either hot or cold in supermarkets, vending machines, conbinis, and so on.

Here's an example sentence that mentions that and another popular tea brand:

Don't worry if those kanji threw you off, by the way. They're not an intuitive reading. We have a lesson about that and other surprising kanji readings here:

More unexpected kanji readings

From Milestone 32 (Phase Three, Unit 93).

NativShark goodie bag

NativShark Units

3 new Units have been added to Phase Three!

We'll get back to 4 Units as soon as we can, thank you for your patience!

As always, these Units are filled with vocab in unique contexts, any relevant new kanji, and natural conversations called Dialogues at the end, all of which are designed to get you functional in Japanese as efficiently as possible.

These Units also feature the following lessons:

Thanks for reading all the way to the end, I hope you enjoyed this one ^^

Good luck out there and happy studies,
Ty & the NativShark Team