History and culture
Coffee's arrival in Europe and the rise of the European coffeehouse
Coffee reached Europe via Venetian trade in the early 17th century, followed by coffeehouses in Oxford, London, Paris and Vienna over the course of that century.
Each section below is labelled by how well-established its claims are — look for the label under each heading.
Venetian trade
Documented history · early 17th century · Venice, Europe
Coffee is documented as having reached Europe primarily through Venetian merchants trading with the Ottoman Empire in the early 17th century, with the drink gradually spreading to other European trading cities from there.
Sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica coffee and coffeehouse history entries; The World Atlas of Coffee
Coffeehouses in England and France
Documented history · mid-to-late 17th century · England, France
England's first coffeehouses opened in Oxford and London in the mid-17th century, and Paris followed with its own coffeehouse culture later in the century. These venues became associated with intellectual, commercial and political discussion, a pattern that echoed the earlier Ottoman coffeehouse tradition.
Sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica coffee and coffeehouse history entries; The World Atlas of Coffee
The Vienna coffeehouse origin story
Disputed among historians · late 17th century · Vienna
A popular story credits Vienna's coffeehouse tradition to sacks of coffee left behind by Ottoman forces after the 1683 Siege of Vienna, supposedly claimed and put to use by a local figure. This dramatic founding story is widely repeated, but historians generally regard it as an embellished or partly invented narrative — coffee and coffeehouses were already reaching other parts of Europe through ordinary trade around the same period, and the specific 'abandoned sacks' account is not well supported by contemporary evidence.
Sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica coffee and coffeehouse history entries; The World Atlas of Coffee
Related
How to order this abroad
Where it was drunk
The institutions this history runs through, in CoffeeHQ's coffeehouse-history layer.
- The Ottoman coffeehouse (kahvehane) — The institution that invented the coffeehouse — a public room, open to men of any rank who could pay, where coffee was drunk, backgammon played, news exchanged and stories performed, and which the Ottoman state repeatedly tried to close.
- The Viennese coffee house — A public room in which a single small coffee buys an afternoon — marble tables, Thonet chairs, a wall of newspapers and a glass of water refilled unasked — and the most self-conscious coffeehouse culture in Europe.
- The London coffeehouse — The room where English commerce and science did their talking for a century — Lloyd's, the Stock Exchange and the Royal Society all trace to one — sold on a penny's admission, open to men who could pay and effectively closed to women.