ABSTRACT
According to Chinese legend, Shen Nong, a famous Chinese emperor who was also a ‘creative scientist’, discovered tea nearly 5000 years ago in 2737 BC. His farreaching edicts required that all drinking water be boiled as a hygienic precaution. One summer day when he was visiting a distant region of his realm he and his court stopped to rest. As the servants began to boil water, dried leaves from a nearby bush fell into the boiling water, producing a brown liquid. The Emperor drank some and found it very refreshing. Thus tea was created and Shen Nong earned the title of ‘father of tea’. His intriguing description of tea has some validity even today; he credited tea with being ‘good for tumors or abscesses that come about the head, or for ailments of the bladder. It dissipates heat caused by the phlegm, or inflammation of the chest. It quenches thirst, lessens the desire for sleep and gladdens and cheers the heart’1.
