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The significance of tea as well as the processes of tea production were revolutionized during the Ming Dynasty.

Tea as tribute
During Ming, tea was a form of currency also used to pay imperials tribute. Ming Dynasty founder Zhu Yuanzhang(also known as the Hongwu emperor) was born to a poor family and understood the difficulties of the lives of farmers. He abolished the compressed tea brick style and replaced it with the whole, loose-leaf tea style, and also declared people instead pay tribute with tea buds. This amendment especially helped relieve tea farmers of some of the pressures of the laborious and complicated tea production processes. These complex processes for farmers included: steaming tea leaves, breaking them down into fine remnants, mixing the powder with plum juice, then baking them with molds to shape into tea bricks.

Tea in literature
Literature during this time also largely focused on tea pickers, with writings and artwork regarding aspects such as tea picking and processing.

Tea-picking Poem - Gao Qi

It is getting warm after the spring rain and thunder,

New tea leaves start sprouting among branches.

Girls with silver hairpins sing folk songs to each other,

Competing to pick the most tea leaves in the shortest time.

They get home with the fresh scent of tea leaves on their hands,

The highest qualities will be sent to the Prefecture first.

The newly baked tea leaves are not tasted yet,

They are packed into baskets and will be sold to Hunan merchants.

Satirical poems and songs were also created and reflected struggles of tea farmers and ridiculed greedy officials. After Mid Ming, the amount of tribute tea soared due to an increased pressure upon citizens by higher bureaucrats. Officials demanded higher taxation and escalation of the requirement of tribute tea. Some citizens began to grow angry with these demands, including poets Gao Qi and Han Bangqi. Although their main occupations were government officials, they were also generally acknowledged writers who voiced their complaints through poems that became widespread folk ballads. Through their writings they requested the reduction of taxation and tributes. However, Gao was accused by the government of "involvement in a rebellion conspiracy” and was executed, while Han was imprisoned by officials wanting to hide their written works.

Fuyang Ballad - Han Bangqi

Tea-picking women and fish-catching men

Feudal officials torture them so they don't even have unscathed skin

How come the Heaven is not humane?

Have people here done anything wrong?

Tea farmers
Tea households were normally small, family-based operations for tea cultivation. There were also tea merchants who set up tea firms to create their own tea plantations and/or to process tea leaves after buying from local tea farming families. Different from tea households, seasonal workers were often employed by tea firms. Seeking work during the harvesting seasons, they often took boats to Tunxi, Anhui and other places where tea leaves were abundant.

Tea production process
Harvesting tea was heavily dependent on weather conditions, so tea could not usually be produced throughout the entire year. Various weather conditions throughout different areas limited tea to be grown in a few specific regions: Jiangnan, Jiangbei, Hunan and Xinan. These areas provided stable warm weather and rainfall- two essential components of growing tea plants. The general production of loose, whole-leaf teas mainly included: tea seedling plantation, fertilization/weeding/spraying, tea picking, sunning/firing/rolling, and sorting and packaging.

Tea picking
Tea picking was a central component of the entire tea production process. Time spent working and the intensity of labor fluctuated due to the inability to accurately predict weather conditions. This created uncertainties regarding ideal tea picking times. However, generally “the ideal time for picking tea leaves was early morning before sunrise.” Tea pickers would usually leave their homes early and do work using careful techniques efficiently to ensure the leaves were gently picked in whole. To do so, pickers used one or both hands to nip the green stems with their index fingers and thumbs, then held the leaves until they had palms-full before tossing the leaves into their baskets. Women were preferred for this occupation because of their ability to more gently and carefully pick off the whole tea leaves. No matter the age or marital status, women were expected to be capable of performing this duty. However, there were also limitations on women during this time. According to Luo Lin’s Explanation ofTea, women were not allowed to participate in any aspect of tea making during their menstrual periods. They were to avoid “female pollution” from their “unclean” bodies.

Sunning, firing and rolling
After picking tea leaves, families first sorted out the damaged or rotten leaves then began the sunning process. This process inhibited water evaporation within tea leaves to promote oxidation. Over-oxidation can alter the taste of the tea to become "grass-like" or thick and bitter, so farmers heated the leaves to stop the oxidation once the desired level was reached- a process known as 'firing'. Then, leaf cells were broken down by gently rubbing the tea leaves- this process helped volatilize the scents and tastes when brewing. Tea leaves were damped then rolled into shapes, making its storage convenient while also allowing sap to squeeze out and provide additional flavoring.

Sorting and packaging
Once the leaves were dried again, they were sorted and packaged and sold. Tea was usually "transported by a train of porters who used carrying poles to transport multiple chests of tea to the shippers", as the tea was largely sold to merchants and also largely produced to be exported.