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Part 1 : Half Green, Half Red. Where Does the Question Begin
The origin of qingcha, mainly known as oolong tea is often approached as a geographical question. A place on the map. A mountain range. Sometimes an entire county. Yet the discussion did not begin with geography. It began with interpretation.
Long before maps entered the conversation, a small number of historical texts were quoted repeatedly. Over time, those quotations began to carry more weight than they were originally intended to bear. What began as description gradually hardened into conclusion.
In modern discussions of oolong tea origins, geography appears almost immediately—Wuyishan, Anxi, sometimes Zhangzhou. The debate is typically framed in simple terms: which place came first.
Historically, however, the argument did not begin with places. It began with words.
Among the most frequently cited sources are the poems "Wuyi Cha Ge" and "Anxi Cha Ge", written during the Kangxi period by Ruan Minxi during the late 17th to early 18th century. Another text often drawn into the discussion is *Xu Cha Jing* (Continuation of the Tea Classic), compiled by Lu Tingcan, which quotes passages from *Cha Shuo* (Tea Discourse) attributed to Wang Caotang.
These works describe tea production in Fujian. Mountains and valleys appear. Harvest seasons. Roasting fires. Tea moving along rivers toward coastal trade ports. All ordinary observations.
Nothing in these passages was originally written to answer the modern question of where qingcha (oolong tea) began. Yet over time, certain lines began to attract particular attention. A remark about roasting. A brief reference to leaf colour. Occasionally, even a single phrase was treated as evidence.
Ban Qing Ban Hong (half green, half red)
The phrase appears in several early tea texts and is frequently cited in discussions of qingcha origins. From there, a conclusion often follows: if such leaves were described in records associated with Wuyi, perhaps the tea itself began there. But historical writing rarely works in this way.
Most early texts simply record what was observed. They describe practices already in use—the harvesting of leaves, the roasting of tea, the colours appearing during processing. They rarely attempt to document the moment when a new technique first emerged.
That distinction can easily fade when later readers approach these texts with a specific question in mind. A description of colour becomes a technical explanation. A passing remark about roasting becomes evidence of invention.
Once interpretation enters the discussion, the debate begins to take shape.
Different scholars read the same lines differently. Some see Wuyishan. Others point toward Anxi. The sources themselves do not change, only the conclusions do. Tea history often unfolds in this way. Documents move slowly across centuries; interpretations move more quickly. Over time, the story can grow stronger than the evidence that first suggested it. Stories tend to spread easily. Careful reading rarely does.
So before asking where qingcha (oolong tea) began, another question needs to be asked: what exactly do the documents say? That question leads directly to the texts most often cited in support of the Wuyishan origin theory.
