Yemen and the Port of Mocha

Summary

Coffee was first grown as a crop in Yemen, from seeds taken out of the coffee forests of southwestern Ethiopia. The earliest reliable evidence of coffee drinking comes from Sufi circles in Yemen in the fifteenth century. For the next two centuries Yemen supplied coffee to the Middle East and Europe through its Red Sea port of Mocha, whose name became a word for fine coffee. In the late 1600s coffee seeds left Yemen for India, and from there the Dutch carried coffee to Java. From these few seeds came most of the world's Arabica coffee, including the traditional coffee of Puerto Rico.

From Ethiopia to Yemen

Arabica coffee is native to Ethiopia, where the species shows its greatest genetic diversity. According to World Coffee Research, historians believe coffee seeds were taken from the forests of southwestern Ethiopia to Yemen, where coffee was first cultivated as a crop. Genetic tests show that the main seeds taken to Yemen were related to the Bourbon and Typica varieties.

Yemen lies at the southwestern corner of the Arabian Peninsula. Across the narrow strait of Bab el-Mandeb, roughly 30 kilometres wide at its narrowest (sources give 29 to 32 km), lie Djibouti and Eritrea.

Coffee drinking itself appears in the record in Yemen in the fifteenth century, among Sufis who drank it to stay awake for night devotions. Historians differ slightly on the date: the art historian Nancy Um places it in the early fifteenth century, while the historian Ralph Hattox found Arabic sources that set it in the mid-fifteenth century at the earliest.

Illustration of terraced coffee farms at Attara, Yemen

Coffee plantation on terraces at Attara, near Menakha, Yemen, in an illustration from Walter Burton Harris, "A Journey through the Yemen" (1893). British Library / Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

The Port of Mocha

Mocha (al-Mukhā, also spelled Mokha) stands on Yemen's Red Sea coast. Britannica describes it as Yemen's most renowned historic port, and records that coffee for the European and Middle Eastern markets was its chief export from the fifteenth century. Tradition links the town's founding to the Sufi holy man Shaykh al-Shādhilī, who is said to have introduced coffee drinking to Arabia.

The Ottomans developed Mocha as a major port in the sixteenth century. The town passed to the Yemeni imam in 1636 and prospered in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Indian traders visited regularly, and the English and Dutch East India Companies traded there; their records are among the main sources on the port's history.

The English word "mocha", meaning fine coffee, is recorded from 1773 and comes from the name of the port. Its use for a mixture of coffee and chocolate is recorded by 1849.

French plan of the port of Mocha, 1737

Plan of the roadstead and town of Mocha, put under contribution by ships and troops of the French East India Company under Delagarde Jazier in 1737 (French, anonymous). Bibliothèque nationale de France / Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Watch: How Yemen once introduced the world to mocha coffee — Al Arabiya English

Coffee Leaves Yemen

By the late 1600s coffee trees from Yemen were growing in India, in the Mysore region then known as Malabar. World Coffee Research dates the first seeds sent from Yemen to India to 1670, carried by Baba Budan. DNA studies indicate that this introduction included both Bourbon-type and Typica-type coffee.

Legend: Baba Budan is often said to have smuggled seven seeds out of Yemen strapped to his body. That detail is a story, not a documented fact.

The Dutch tried to plant seeds from Yemen directly in Batavia (now Jakarta, on Java) in 1690, but those plants died in 1699 after an earthquake. They then sent seeds from the Malabar coast of India to Java in 1696 and 1699. So the Typica coffee of Java came from India, not straight from Yemen as is often told.

In 1706 a single coffee plant was taken from Java to the botanical garden in Amsterdam. In 1714 the mayor of Amsterdam gave a plant to King Louis XIV of France, and it grew in the greenhouse of the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. From the Netherlands, coffee went to Dutch Guiana (Suriname) in 1719, to French Guiana in 1722 and to northern Brazil in 1727. From Paris, plants reached Martinique in the West Indies in 1723.

The French also tried three times, in 1708, 1715 and 1718, to bring coffee from Yemen to the island of Bourbon (now Réunion). That introduction gave rise to the Bourbon lineage.

Mocha's Decline

Britannica records that the port's decline was hastened by the Dutch coffee plantations on Java and by the rise of coffee in South America. Nancy Um notes that the Dutch, after decades of experiment, improved the quality and quantity of their Java coffee in the early decades of the eighteenth century. Yemen's trade later shifted to Aden and to the port of al-Ḥudaydah.

Qishr

Yemen also has a traditional drink made not from the coffee bean but from the dried husk of the coffee cherry. Called qishr, it is usually spiced with ginger and sometimes cinnamon.

Yemen and Puerto Rico

The coffee that colonised the Americas in the eighteenth century belongs to the Typica lineage that World Coffee Research traces from Yemen, through India and Java, to Amsterdam and Paris. Puerto Rico's traditional coffee is of this Typica type. For more on the variety, see the article on the Typica variety. For coffee's arrival in Istanbul, see Coffee's Spread to the Ottoman Empire.

Key Facts

Origin of Arabica: the forests of southwestern Ethiopia
First grown as a crop: in Yemen
Earliest evidence of coffee drinking: Yemen, fifteenth century, among Sufis
Port of Mocha: coffee its chief export from the fifteenth century; prospered in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries
Coffee to India: 1670, attributed to Baba Budan
Coffee to Java: 1696 and 1699, from India
One plant to Amsterdam: 1706; to Paris, 1714
Word "mocha": from 1773 for fine coffee; for coffee with chocolate by 1849

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Is Mocha a real place? Yes. Mocha (al-Mukhā) is a port town on Yemen's Red Sea coast, the country's most renowned historic port.

Q: Why is a coffee-and-chocolate drink called a mocha? The word "mocha" first meant fine coffee shipped from the port of Mocha. Its use for coffee mixed with chocolate is recorded by 1849.

Q: How did coffee leave Yemen? Seeds reached India by about 1670, attributed to Baba Budan. The Dutch then carried coffee from India to Java in 1696 and 1699, and a plant from Java reached Amsterdam in 1706.

Q: Which country lies across the water from Yemen? Djibouti and Eritrea, across the strait of Bab el-Mandeb.

Q: What is qishr? A traditional Yemeni drink made from dried coffee cherry husks, usually spiced with ginger.

Sources

World Coffee Research, "History of Arabica", Arabica Coffee Varieties catalogue. Supports: Ethiopian origin; first cultivation in Yemen; Bourbon- and Typica-related seeds; Baba Budan and India (1670); the Dutch attempts of 1690, 1696 and 1699; Amsterdam 1706; Paris 1714; Suriname 1719, French Guiana 1722, Brazil 1727; Martinique 1723; Bourbon island 1708, 1715 and 1718.
Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Mocha". Supports: Yemen's most renowned historic port; coffee as chief export from the fifteenth century; the traditional link to Shaykh al-Shādhilī; Indian traders; the imam in 1636; prosperity in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries; decline and the shift to Aden and al-Ḥudaydah.
MBI Al Jaber Foundation, report on Professor Nancy Um's lecture "Mocha in the 17th and 18th Centuries – Yemen's Age of Coffee" (December 2022). Supports: Ottoman development of Mocha; East India Company records; coffee drinking in early fifteenth-century Yemen; the improvement of Java coffee in the early eighteenth century.
Muslim Heritage (Foundation for Science, Technology and Civilisation), "The Coffee Route from Yemen to London". Supports: Hattox's view that Arabic sources set the introduction of coffee drinking in Yemen in the mid-fifteenth century at the earliest.
Online Etymology Dictionary, "mocha". Supports: "mocha" for fine coffee from 1773, named from the port; "coffee and chocolate" by 1849.
Windward, "The Bab el-Mandeb Strait", and GlobalSecurity.org, "Bab al-Mandab strait". Support: the strait about 32 km and 29 km wide at its narrowest; Yemen opposite Djibouti and Eritrea.
NYU News (Under the Arch), "At Qahwah House, Yemeni coffee is king" (November 2025). Supports: qishr made from coffee husks, with ginger and cinnamon.

Claims this encyclopedia could not source

The following statements appear in published material about Yemen and Mocha. This encyclopedia could not trace them to a reliable source:

That Yemen was the world's sole coffee exporter for nearly two hundred years.
That Yemeni authorities had all exported coffee parched or boiled so that it could not be planted.
That Mocha was one of the busiest ports in the world, with dozens of ships in its harbour at any time.
The flavour descriptions given for the Yemeni coffees Udaini, Dawairi and Tuffahi, and the claim that Bura'i is the oldest documented Yemeni variety.
That chocolate-and-coffee drinks are called "mocha" because coffee shipped from Mocha tasted of chocolate.
That Yemeni coffee predates every other commercial coffee tradition on Earth.

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