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Coffee grows wild in the highlands of Ethiopia, but it first became a popular drink in Yemen by the late 15th century. Coffeehouses then spread across the Ottoman world and reached Istanbul in 1554.

Istanbul, 1554

HistoryHealth

The story behind the card

The first coffee drinkers on record were Sufi mystics in Yemen, who used it to stay awake through night-time devotions. The popular tale of a goatherd who noticed his goats grow lively after eating coffee berries first appears in writing in 1671 and is best treated as legend. According to the Ottoman chronicler İbrahim Peçevi, Istanbul's first coffeehouse opened in the Tahtakale district in 1554, run by two Arab merchants, Hakem from Aleppo and Şems from Damascus. Coffeehouses soon became places where people talked, played games and swapped news, and their popularity worried rulers: Selim II in 1567 and Murad III in 1583 tried taxes and restrictions, and Murad IV later closed them altogether.

Türkçe oku
Kahve bitkisi Etiyopya'nın yaylalarında kendiliğinden yetişir, ama kahve ilk kez 15. yüzyılın sonlarında Yemen'de sevilen bir içeceğe dönüştü. Kahvehaneler oradan bütün Osmanlı dünyasına yayıldı ve 1554'te İstanbul'a ulaştı.
İstanbul, 1554

Kahve içtiği bilinen ilk kişiler, geceleri ibadet ederken uyanık kalmak için ondan yararlanan Yemenli sufilerdi. Keçilerinin kahve meyvesi yedikten sonra hareketlendiğini fark eden çobanın hikâyesi ise yazılı kaynaklarda ilk kez 1671'de görülür; ona bir efsane olarak bakmak daha doğrudur. Osmanlı tarihçisi İbrahim Peçevi'ye göre İstanbul'un ilk kahvehanesini 1554'te Tahtakale'de Halepli Hakem ile Şamlı Şems adlı iki Arap tüccar açtı. Kahvehaneler kısa sürede sohbet edilen, oyun oynanan, haber alınıp verilen yerlere dönüştü. Bu hareketlilik yöneticileri kaygılandırdı: II. Selim 1567'de, III. Murad 1583'te vergi ve yasaklarla kahveyi sınırlamaya çalıştı; IV. Murad ise daha sonra kahvehaneleri tümüyle kapattı.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: History of coffee
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