Tea Revives the World Map 1940

'Let's have a cup of tea!' Six little words that provide solace for those in distress; companionship for those who are alone; refreshment for those who are working or just an excuse to take the weight off your feet, settle down and have a chat with a friend.

Tea plays a colossal part in our lives yet people know very little of its origins or quite how it makes its way across the world into the little bag that is popped into the pot millions of times a day. This map helps to explain the culture and history that surrounds the one substance that none of us are worried about being addicted to.

Indeed we should be pleased that we are for it possesses many health giving qualities. In the darkest days of the Second World War Winston Churchill recognised that if supplies of tea did not reach servicemen and women fighting overseas and those at home working in factories and on the land there would be a damaging loss of morale.

This map was produced in 1940 as part of a campaign of reassurance that all would be well. It also throws light on the extraordinary story of tea and shows us its origins, its culture but most of all it shows what fun the human race has had with the drink that is second only to water in worldwide popularity. The map, exquisitely drawn by MacDonald Gill, shows gold miners drinking tea in the Yukon, tells us that it was served 1000 miles up the Amazon and explains that on the remote island of Tristan da Cunha wrongdoers were penalised by being deprived of their cuppa and as far apart as Iceland and New Zealand tea is made with hot water that gushes out of the ground. Packed with snippets of history and amusing quotations it is just the thing to explore as you wait for the kettle to boil. A history of tea accompanies every map.