How Did the Tradition of Afternoon Tea Get Started?

The Duchess of Bedford

It's the seventh Duchess of Bedford, Anna Maria Russell, who we have to thank for the invention of afternoon tea, sometime around 1840. Due to increasing urbanisation and the rise in industrialisation (including the spread of gas lighting in England), the evening meal was becoming later and later. Whereas in rural farming communities the day had an early start and finished when the sun went down, wealthier classes, unhindered by such practicalities, were now having dinner closer to 9pm – with lunch many hours earlier at midday.

The Duchess of Bedford, who was one of Queen Victoria's ladies-in-waiting, was having none of it. Describing a 'sinking feeling' at about 5pm, she became despondent at the void between lunch and dinner. She requested that some tea, bread and butter and cake was brought to her room in the late afternoon – and with that one request of a lady's grumbling stomach, an afternoon ritual was born. Needing very little prompting to find an occasion to squeeze in another cup of tea and a piece of cake, the upper classes ate it up and the fashionable custom soon spread across Britain.

Written by food historian Tasha Marks. Read more at: The British Museum blog

Tea, coffee and freedom

Fragile teacups aside, I believe that Victorian afternoon tea could be considered a radical feminist act. While coffee occupied a more masculine external world in 19th-century London, the interior realms of tea were a more feminine affair. Afternoon tea allowed women to entertain mixed company at home without their husbands and was therefore liberating, both socially and practically. This freedom continued into the dresses they were wearing, which were designed to be worn indoors, in the intimate company of friends and family and away from the public eye. As a result, they used less boning to hold their shape and were made of light, flowing fabrics. Free from some of the Victorian era's performative and literal corsetry, afternoon tea was a place where women took centre stage and were able to exchange ideas, opinions and a healthy dose of gossip.