Cocoa bean worshipped by the Mayans and Aztecs

In ancient Latin America, chocolate was worshipped. Both the Mayan and Aztec people had gods that they believed were responsible for bringing chocolate to the earth. Chocolate is often referred to as the "food of the gods". The phrase may have its roots in the Mayan religion.

The two cultures, Mayan and Aztec consumed chocolate as a drink, which was popular among nobility.

Mayans worshipping the cocoa bean as an idol closely linked to the merchant god Ek Chuah, and vases filled with cocoa beans were a common offering to the gods at the funerals of leading men in Mayan history.

According to Aztec mythology, the cacao tree was brought down from heaven by a god named Quetzacoatl. So, the drink made from its beans was believed to impart wisdom and power.

The Olmecs, who lived in what is now Southern Central America from around 1200 BC, are believed to be the first tribe to actually farm the cocoa tree. They also believed the seeds of the plant held an almost mythical quality, guaranteeing health and power.

The Olmecs were succeeded by the Mayans, who began cultivating cocoa trees on organized plantations in the lowlands of South Yucatan from around 600 AD.

It was believed that the cocoa bean had magical powers, and it was used during major life events like births, marriages and deaths.
Cocoa bean worshipped by the Mayans and Aztecs

History of cocoa beans as barter currency

It was the first civilization of the Americas, the Olmec, living some three millennia ago in the humid lowlands of the Mexican Gulf Coast, who first domesticated the cocoa plant.

The cacao bean was so significant to the local cultures that it was used as a currency in trade, given to warriors as a post-battle reward, and served at royal feasts.

During the fourteenth century, the Aztecs conquered a large part of Central America and became the dominant power. In addition to enjoying chocolatl as a beverage, the Aztecs so prized the beans that they used them as currency. In an Aztec market, one bean could buy a tamale or a tomato; 100 beans could buy a turkey. A copper ax cost a whopping 8,000 beans.

A rabbit could be purchased for 10 cacao beans or a llama for 50 beans. A large successful household might be taxed 20 of the 50 Ziquipilli it produced in a year.

Aztec warriors were paid with cocoa beans and it was part of their regular military rations. The great wealth of the Aztec ruler Moctezuma was based on cacao currency.

The Mayan people of southeastern Mexico also used cocoa beans as currency, to buy anything from avocados to turkeys to sex.

In 1544, the cocoa industry at this time began to flourish with the help of Dominican Friars who were assigned to learn the secrets of the bean from the Mayans. Once they perfected their craft of processing the cocoa, the friars began to share their discovery with the wider world, leading to cocoa being used as currency in Europe as it once was among ancient Mayans and Aztecs.
History of cocoa beans as barter currency

Early discovery of cocoa beans by European

Around 1300 AD, the Toltecs and later the Aztecs established their communities in Mexico. Adopting much of the Toltec tradition and religion, the Aztecs worshipped Queztalcoatl, the feathered god of cocoa. They consumed chocolate mainly as part of their religious ceremonies honoring Queztalcoal.

Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer and is famous because he found something he wasn't looking for. The fourth of Christopher Columbus left Spain on May 1502.

The first meeting of Western civilization with cocoa occurred: Christopher Columbus reached the island of Guanaja off the coast of Honduras., and he was greeted by natives later received the gift of a cup of chocolate. The natives gave him a sackful of cacao beans in exchange for some of his own merchandise.

Columbus at first, then Cortes, discovered in the Americas the cocoa plant, but only Hernando Cortez brought the seeds to Europe.

The Spanish explorer Hernando Cortez went to America in 1519. He visited the Mexican emperor Montezuma. He saw that Montezuma drank cacao mixed with vanilla and spices. Cortez took some cacao home as a gift to the Spanish King Charles.

Though Hernando Cortez had ventured to Mexico in search of gold, he was impressed by the fact that the Aztecs used cocoa beans as currency. Cortez had started the first cocoa plantations on Trinidad, Haiti, and the West African island of Bioko to grow “money” to trade with Aztecs for gold.

Starting from 1660, the drinking of hot sweet chocolate spreaded across Europe: Belgium, Germany and Switzerland, and also Austria and Italy.
Early discovery of cocoa beans by European

History of Cocoa

History of Cocoa 

The term of ‘cocoa’ is a corruption of the world ‘cacao’ that is taken directly from Mayan and Aztec languages. Chocolate is derived from cocoa beans, central to the fruit of cocoa tree. 

Theobroma cacao which is indigenous to South America and believed to have originated from the Amazon and Orinoco valleys. 

Theobroma (food of the gods) are the family Sterculiaceae with four principal types: Criollo, about 5% of world cocoa production and the more common Forastero, with smaller, flatter and purple beans; Nacional with fine flavour, grown in Ecuador. The fourth variety Trinitario, a more disease-resistant hybrid of Criollo and Forastero is regarded as a flavour bean. 

Theobroma cacao grows between tropics of Cancer and Capricorn with varieties originating in forest areas of South America. 

Forastero – a basic cocoa, grows mainly in Brazil and West Africa, whilst flavour cocoas are largely hybrids and are cultivated in Central and South America, via Caribbean islands, and Hernandos Cortex, a Spanish, took cocoa to Spain as a beverage and to Spanish Guinea as a crop. 

The Spanish not only took cocoa to Europe but also introduce the crop into Fernando Po in the seventeenth century and thus laid the foundation of the future economics of many West African countries. 

Currently West Africa produces around 68% of world cocoa, while the share of the Far East is projected to remain at 18 percent and that of Latin America and the Caribbean at 14 percent. 

In 2010 world grindings of cocoa beans, a proxy for world cocoa consumption, would amount to 3.6 million tones, reflecting an average annual increase of 2.1 percent from 2.8 million tones during the base period. 

History of Cocoa

Cocoa

When Cortez and the conquestadors landed in Mexico in 1519, they found that the Aztecs had for centuries been using the ground roasted seeds of the cacao tree to make an extremely unusual and pleasant drink which they called “chocolatl”. In due course, the tree was studied and classified as Theobroma cacao, L., which in Greek means “food for the Gods”. The beverage was first introduced into Spain from where its popularity spread through Europe. Today, it is universally appreciated and cacao is cultivated in most equatorial countries. The main commercial crops of cocoa beans come from Ghana, Brazil, Nigeria, Dominica, Ecuador and Venezuela with much smaller quantities from the West Indies.

To avoid confusion over nomenclature it is well to note the following descriptions:

Cacao
–refers to the plant Theobroma cacao, L.

Cocoa
–refers to the beans and the product ready for making the beverage; to its use as a flavoring material; or to its use for making the chocolate beverage.

Chocolate
–refers to the product based on ground roasted cocoa beans , normally in a solid form; although powdered “ drinking chocolate” is available.