Have you ever imagined what your daily life would be like without the use of sugar? Bitter soft drinks, without candies, chewing gum, chocolates or sweets of any kind. Can you imagine coffee without sugar? Argh... But it was without sugar that society survived for most of human history, with sugar only began to spread as a broader consumer article around the 17th century, when large-scale production began. climbing sugar cane on the American continent, mainly in the Portuguese colony.
Not all sugar is made from sugar cane, as there is, for example, sugar obtained from beetroot. And even without sugar as we know it, older populations used the honey as a way to sweeten culinary products. But as the best known is cane sugar, which we buy in the supermarket already solidified, its story will be told.
Sugarcane was already produced in India for over 6,000 years, however there is information that the existence of this vegetable in the islands of South Pacific was verified much earlier, around 20,000 BC. Ç. From the place where we know it today as New Guinea, sugar cane plantations would have spread throughout the region and reached the region. India.
Sugarcane, the raw material for sugar, was disseminated around the world mainly with the Arabs
In India, sugarcane juice is extracted for consumption, and it became known to Westerners when Alexander's soldier, the Great, named Niarchos, arrived with an expedition to the valley of the Indus River and found the inhabitants of the region drinking the fermented sugarcane juice. From then on, it started to be traded with the Greeks and later with the Romans, at very high prices, being restricted to rich people.
If before, only fermented broth was consumed, around the year 600 d. Ç. it started to be consumed in another way, with the development by the Persians of refinement techniques. The objective was to facilitate the stocking, transport and trade of the product, without it fermenting. After winning the Persia by the Arabs in 650 d. C., sugar spread through the arab empire.
The contacts of Europeans with the Arabs, through the crusades, contributed to the dissemination of the product in the Western. But this oriental spice was still extremely rare and its use was still restricted to rich people, or used as a remedy against the Black Death. It also served as a way to conserve fruit, and in royal courts they used sugar to carve sculptures of ships and palaces, which were displayed at festivals.
The contact of Portuguese and Spanish people with the Arabs in the Iberian Peninsula may have been the reason why the cultivation of sugar cane spread in the american colonies, from the 17th century. From then on, sugarcane production expanded, and sugar consumption expanded to all classes of the population. As it is a product with a large amount of energy, in the second half of the century, a new industrial use was found for sugarcane, which began to be used for the production of fuel alcohol.
By Tales Pinto
Graduated in History