Cai Xiang And Record Of Tea

Cai Xiang (1012-1067) was a top politician and the tea expert as well as one of the four most successful calligraphers of Song Dynasty. Based on big-dragon tea roll, he invented the delicate looking, meticulously made, and superb tasting small-dragon tea roll, which soon became a nonesuch. Contemporaries exclaimed: gold was easy to get while small-dragon roll was hard to attain. Cai Xiang was expert on tea. Once upon a time, he visited a good friend. The host prepared small-dragon roll for him on purpose, but Cai Xiang said upon the first sip, "there must be big-dragon roll in it." The host immediately blamed the kid-servant who prepared the tea. The servant had only to admit that just now more guests arrived. Not having enough time to prepare tea, he mixed the two kinds of roll together. This story is similar to that of Lu Yu telling water but more credible. Cai Xiang was the inventor of small-dragon roll, so naturally he knew it like the back of his hand. Had the kid-servant known this, he wouldn't have dared to lie in front of Cai Xiang.

Lu Yu's The Book of Tea didn't mention the most renowned tea in Song Dynasty-Beiyuan Tea of Fujian Province. Cai Xiang found this a big pity, so he wrote Record of Tea to compensate for this. Record of Tea consisted of two parts. The first part had ten items, dealing with quality of tea and ways of cooking and drinking. The second part had nine items, talking about apparatus for cooking. Cai Xiang insisted that observing tea with eyes was like physiognomy because the outside told of the inside. Good tea cake was like the face of a healthy person. Its luster, sleekness and compactness were symbols for top- grade quality. Cai Xiang was also for the naturalness of tea and against the practice of adding spices into teacakes.

Being excellent in calligraphy, Cai Xiang often called for tea to add fun to the pleasure of calligraphy writing. When asked for inscription, he was often given tea as tea gift sets. Cai Xiang never lost in any competition in tea. Because of his excellence in tea and calligraphy, his Record of Tea transcribed by himself of course became priceless, causing many people's extreme jealousy. The book was eventually stolen by a subordinate who published it in secret. The manuscript being stolen, Cai Xiang felt very sorry. The published Record of Tea being full of mistakes, he felt even bitterer. So he had no choice but to spend time rearranging his book. This time he carved the content on a rock for safety’s sake, not having to worry about its being falsified or stolen again.