Coffeehouses and Their Social Impact

image
Coffee DrinkingThis sixteenth-century miniature depicts men drinking coffee at a banquet. (© The Trustees of the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, Ireland/The Bridgeman Art Library)> PICTURING THE PASTANALYZING THE IMAGE: What activities are people engaged in? How does the artist convey differences in the ages of those drinking coffee?CONNECTIONS: What made coffee a popular drink for people socializing?

In the mid-fifteenth century a new social convention spread throughout the Islamic world — drinking coffee. Arab writers trace the origins of coffee drinking to Yemen Sufis, who sought a trancelike concentration on God to the exclusion of everything else and found that coffee helped them stay awake. Merchants carried the Yemenite practice to Mecca in about 1490. From Mecca, where pilgrims were introduced to it, coffee drinking spread to Egypt and Syria. In 1555 two Syrians opened a coffeehouse in Istanbul.

Coffeehouses provided a place for conversation and male sociability; there a man could entertain his friends cheaply and more informally than at home. But coffeehouses encountered religious and governmental opposition, as some authorities saw them as a threat to public morality. On the other hand, the coffee trade was a major source of profit that local notables sought to control.

Although debate over the morality of coffeehouses continued through the sixteenth century, their eventual acceptance represented a revolution in Islamic life: socializing was no longer confined to the home. In the seventeenth century coffee and coffeehouses spread to Europe.

Principle Arguments Against Coffeehouses:

  • Because of its composition, coffee is intoxicating, making it analogous to wine, prohibited to Muslims
  • Coffee drinking was an innovation and therefore a violation of Islamic law
  • Coffeehouses encouraged political discussions, facilitating sedition
  • Coffeehouses attracted unemployed soldiers and other low types, encouraging immoral behavior, such as gambling, using drugs, and soliciting prostitutes
  • Music at coffeehouses encouraged debauchery

>QUICK REVIEW

What factors facilitated cultural exchange between the Islamic empires?