Tee, thé, cha, tsài, tè, teo, chai, teh, chay—these are all words for the beverage made from leaves of the evergreen shrub Camelia sinensis. Wars have been fought to control its trade and gifts of it have been made to ensure peace. It has even been used as currency. In central and northern Asia, bricks of tea were a unit of value and medium of exchange well into the 20th century.
China had a monopoly on the tea trade right up until the 19th century and, as the taste for tea spread, it became an increasingly valuable commodity. It was exchanged for horses in Mongolia and Tibet. Russian caravans travelled for months across Siberia to trade furs for it.
Tea in the form of bricks was durable, easy to pack and, under the right conditions, could be preserved indefinitely. At factories in China’s Sichuan Province, freshly picked leaves were steamed, pounded into powder and then packed into moulds. The bricks were then dried or baked in the sun to harden.
The characters tell us that the brick was made by the China Tea Industrial Corporation at the Zhao-Li-Qiao Tea Brick Factory in Hubei Province. Tea brick, China, mid 20th century
The value of a brick depended on both the quality of the tea and the distance it had travelled from China. A French missionary travelling in Tibet in the 19th century wrote, “men bargain by stipulating so many bricks or packets (4 bricks) of tea.” Workmen and servants were paid in bricks of tea and a horse cost 20 packets. At the beginning of the 20th century, Western adventurers in remote parts of Mongolia and Tibet found that they couldn’t use gold or silver to buy supplies, but could only use tea.
A very practical money, each tea brick was scored so that sections could be broken off for change, small purchases, or a quick pot of tea. Tea brick, China, mid 20th century
The tea brick shown here was produced in the People’s Republic of China sometime in the mid-20th century. It is in the Bank of Canada Museum’s National Currency Collection and can be seen in Zone 4 of our main gallery along with many curious and fascinating objects that have been used as money.
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The Museum Blog
June 15, 2016
New Acquisitions
By: Paul S. Berry
In May 2013, staff of the Bank of Canada Museum visited BABN and were able to select for the National Currency Collection more than 650 steel dies (small, engraved metal or “intaglio” plates) and other production tools formerly used by the company to prepare the intaglio printing plates.
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May 24, 2016
A bank NOTE-able Woman II
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On 15 April, the public consultation to select an iconic Canadian woman to appear on a bank note closed. Over 26,000 nominations were received following the Bank of Canada’s open call—a great success.
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May 11, 2016
New Acquisitions
By: Paul S. Berry
Canadians, on occasion, have used money as a signboard for political protest, a platform for social commentary and even as a handy notepad on which to record fleeting thoughts before they are lost.
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April 11, 2016
A bankNOTEable Woman
By: Graham Iddon
Representing significant women on national currency is gaining momentum all over the world. At least 12 countries currently feature historically notable women on their money…
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March 30, 2016
Museum Reconstruction - Part 4
By: Graham Iddon
It seems a pretty strange building but now it has a solid roof, glass walls and doors. Doors? Ah, there’s your clue. It’s no skateboard park—it’s the entrance portico for the Bank of Canada Museum.
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March 15, 2016
Decoding E-Money II
By: Graham Iddon
This has been an extremely challenging exhibition to develop. We are taking, for us, the unprecedented step of interpreting something that is not only current but continually changing.
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February 18, 2016
New Acquisitions
By: David Bergeron
In late April of 2015, the National Currency Collection finally succeeded in acquiring a Spanish gold cob—famous in legends and tales of pirates and their buried treasures!
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December 17, 2015
What’s in Your Stocking?
By: Graham Iddon
Every prop in the holiday drama generally has some sort of symbolic meaning—evergreen trees: life in the dead of winter, holly: Christ’s crown of thorns, the dreidel: Jewish resistance to oppression. Money, on the other hand, only seems to symbolize itself.
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November 10, 2015
Money from Space
Do you notice anything peculiar about this bank note? It’s blue; it’s denominated as 5-dollar; it has handsome portraits of Sir Wilfred Laurier on it…hold on a minute!
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