"The Mountains of Yinsheng City" in the Tang-Dynasty Manshu: The First Record of Yunnan Tea

Nearly every book on pu'er history starts with the same line: "Tea comes from the mountains within the bounds of Yinsheng City." The sentence comes from the Tang-dynasty Manshu (Book of the Southern Barbarians). At only about 30 characters, it's the earliest and most reliable written record of tea production in Yunnan. This post takes the passage apart: who wrote it, when, what it says, and what it doesn't.

What Kind of Book Is the Manshu?

The Manshu, also called the Yunnan Zhi (Record of Yunnan), was written by Fan Chuo of the Tang dynasty. He served on the staff of Cai Xi, the military commissioner of Annan. At the time, Nanzhao and the Tang were in constant conflict along the border, and Fan Chuo was ordered to compile intelligence on Nanzhao: the roads into Yunnan, its mountains, rivers, and towns, the distribution of its peoples, its products, customs, and political system. He produced 10 volumes. Its completion is generally dated to the fourth year of the Xiantong reign of Emperor Yizong of Tang, around 863; some studies date its completion to 862.

The book's transmission was also a winding one. The original was lost after the mid-Ming dynasty, and it wasn't until the Qianlong era of the Qing that scholars reassembled it from the Yongle Encyclopedia and included it in the Wuying Hall movable-type collection. The Manshu we read today is this reconstructed edition.

Fan Chuo himself never traveled to southern Yunnan. Most of the material in the book was compiled from earlier accounts and frontier intelligence. Keep this in mind: it records how Tang people understood Nanzhao, not what the tea farmers themselves said.

What the Original Text Says

The passage on tea is in Volume 7, "Products Within Yunnan," following a section on salt wells and preceding one on lychees and areca nuts. The original reads:

Tea comes from the mountains within the bounds of Yinsheng City; it is gathered loosely, with no method of picking or making. The Mengshe Man boil it together with pepper, ginger, and cinnamon and drink it.

In plain terms: tea grows on the various mountains within the jurisdiction of Yinsheng City. It's harvested haphazardly, with no particular method of picking or processing. When the Mengshe Man drink tea, they boil it together with Sichuan pepper, fresh ginger, and cinnamon bark.

Where Is Yinsheng City Today?

Yinsheng City was the seat of the "Yinsheng Military Command" set up by Nanzhao. It's generally believed to have been around today's Jingdong Yi Autonomous County in Pu'er City, though some accounts place it elsewhere near Jingdong. The Yinsheng command covered a vast area extending south into today's Pu'er and Xishuangbanna, encompassing the regions where the Six Ancient Tea Mountains, Jingmai, Menghai, and other tea areas later emerged.

So "the mountains within the bounds of Yinsheng City" doesn't refer to one particular mountain but to the many mountain areas under the Yinsheng command. On this basis, the Qing scholar Tan Cui reasoned that the Pu'er area anciently belonged to Yinsheng and that its tea was already being drunk in the Tang.

What Does "The Mengshe Man Boil It with Pepper, Ginger, and Cinnamon" Mean?

Broken down word by word:

• Mengshe Man: Nanzhao was originally the "Mengshe Zhao," one of the six zhao (principalities) around Erhai Lake, located around today's Weishan in Dali Prefecture. The Mengshe Man were the tribe of Nanzhao's ruling house. In other words, the people drinking this tea weren't necessarily those on the tea mountains, but Nanzhao's ruling class.
• Pepper, ginger, cinnamon: Sichuan pepper, fresh ginger, and cinnamon bark, all pungent, aromatic seasonings.
• Boil together and drink: The tea and these spices were put in a pot and boiled together, and the brew was drunk, flavors and all.

How Did People in Tang-Dynasty Yunnan Drink Tea?

Judging from this one line in the Manshu, the Nanzhao nobility of the Tang drank tea "boiled," with spices added. That was actually similar to custom in central China at the time: in The Classic of Tea, Lu Yu mentions that ordinary people often boiled tea with scallions, ginger, jujubes, tangerine peel, evodia, and mint. Lu Yu himself didn't much care for this way of drinking it and advocated adding only a little salt and tasting the tea itself.

As for how the people on the tea mountains drank it, the Manshu doesn't say. From the tea customs still kept by Yunnan's peoples today, such as the Blang's bamboo-tube tea and sour tea and the roasted tea of the Wa and Yi, we can imagine that the mountain way of drinking was simpler and closer to daily life, though the Tang left no direct record. You can read about these customs in Yunnan's Roasted Tea.

What This Record Says, and What It Doesn't

It says:

• By the Tang, the mountains around Yinsheng were already producing tea, and the outside world knew it.
• Harvesting was rough and ready, with no established processing craft.
• Nanzhao's upper class had a tea-drinking habit, and they drank it boiled with spices.

It doesn't say:

• The word "pu'er" doesn't appear. "Pu tea" (普茶) doesn't show up until the late Ming, in the Dian Lüe; see Yunnan Tea in the Song, Yuan, and Ming.
• It doesn't say the tea was pressed into cakes, nor does it mention trade or tribute.
• It doesn't say whether the tea trees were planted or the leaves gathered from the wild.

So saying "pu'er tea existed in the Tang" isn't accurate. The more precise statement: by the Tang there was already a record of tea production in southern Yunnan, and these mountains later became pu'er's growing region.

Why This One Sentence Matters So Much

Before the Manshu, accounts of Yunnan tea were mostly legend, and later Song and Yuan texts often just repeated this line. The Southern Song writer Li Shi's Xu Bowu Zhi (Sequel to the Record of Curiosities) says "tea comes from the mountains of Yinsheng, picked at no fixed time, boiled with pepper and ginger and drunk," almost identical in content. Not until the Ming did Yunnan tea get new, independent records. In other words, across the long stretch from the Tang to the Yuan, these roughly 30 characters in the Manshu are almost the only trace Yunnan tea left in the written record.

You can follow the rest of the story in From the Manshu to Tribute Tea: A History of Pu'er.

FAQ

Did pu'er tea exist in the Tang dynasty? The Tang-dynasty Manshu records tea production in the mountains around Yinsheng City, an area that later became pu'er country. But the name "pu'er tea" didn't exist then, and there's no mention of pressing tea into cakes.

Who wrote the Manshu, and when? Fan Chuo of the Tang dynasty. It's generally dated to the fourth year of Xiantong, around 863, though some studies give 862.

Where was Yinsheng City? It's generally believed to be around today's Jingdong in Pu'er City. The Yinsheng command's territory extended south to cover today's tea regions in Pu'er and Xishuangbanna.

What did people in Tang-dynasty Yunnan add to their tea? According to the Manshu, the Mengshe Man boiled tea with Sichuan pepper, ginger, and cinnamon bark.