What is it about that bitter (or sometimes sweet) morning delight that makes people such a fan? This week, we're talking about fans of coffee, and if there is more to it than its magical (and addictive) effects. What is it that has folks questing for the perfect brew?
Next week, we seal the rift in wibbly-wobbly-summer-timey-wimey as we put on some classic rock (and our deerstalker hat) as we interrupt our world travelling with time travelling as we talk about fans of that fascinating meta-fandom: _SuperWhoLock_!
## Episode outline
### Fandom Facts
**Origins:**
There are historical accounts and there are accounts of legend of how coffee was discovered (and in a loose way, the fandom).
One legend tells the story of a 9th-century Ethiopian goatherd, Kaldi, who discovered coffee when he noticed how excited his goats became after eating beans from a coffee plant. That story did not appear in writing until 1671 and is likely apocryphal.
Another legend tells of a Sheikh Omar (known for his ability to cure the sick through prayer) who was exiled to a cave, and found the berries from a shrubbery and tried a variety of ways to prepare them. Starving, he found that boiling them worked best and he was 'revitalized', and stories of this 'miracle drug' caught on (and when he returned he was made a saint).
The first historical record of the plant comes from accounts of 15th century Yemen, where the seeds were roasted and brewed in a way similar to how we prepare coffee today. It was then used by Sufi circles to stay awake for religious rituals. By the 16th century it had reached the rest of the middle east, Persia, Turkey, and north Africa. Later, coffee was introduced to England, France (1657), and Austria and Poland in 1683 after the Battle of Vienna when coffee was captured from supplies of the defeated Turks.
> In 1683, a Franciscan friar named Marciano d’Aviano stopped a Turkish invasion of Austria, and along the way, some claim invented cappuccino. The retreating Turks left behind bags of coffee beans, historians say, which the Viennese found so bitter that they added milk and sugar, creating a frothy, sweet beverage. Legend says the word “cappuccino” comes from d’Aviano’s Capuchin order, so named for their brown robes.
>
> — [I Need Coffee - The Truth About How Major Religions View Coffee](https://ineedcoffee.com/truth-major-religions-view-coffee/)
Interestingly enough, Coffee was not popular when introduced into North America (alcohol was more popular) but started to gain popularity after the war of 1812 when Britain cut off access to tea (which was also in the decline in England, and was harder to make than coffee).
...And then there's a lot more history!
It is the second most traded commodity, _after oil_.
**Size of Fandom:**
Probably in the millions. Looking further down the fandom funnel, there are over 160 000 people subscribed to the coffee subreddit.
**Global Interest:**
[Coffee is popular, and continues to grow popularity over time](https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=coffee); interest in the search term has increased sine the Summer of 2011 to today by about 50%. It is most popular in areas such as Australia, South Africa, the United States, Canada, the UK, Kenya, India, and large parts of Europe and Asia. Worth noting is that [search traffic for Coffee is higher than tea](https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=coffee,tea) although both have been increasing in popularity.
**Related fandoms:**
Tea
**Fanfics:**
There are over 30000 fanfics containing the word 'coffee', some of which are in reference to 'Coffee Shop Alternate Universe (AU)', a situation in fanfic where one of the characters is the barista and the other is a popular customer (though it's not hard to extend the idea). As it turns out, there are a lot of different AUs in fanfic, but that's not coffee related.
### [Last Episode's](http://fanthropological.com/e/live-at-conbravo-chrono-trigger/) Fam...
