Sometime in the 15th century, a drink became popularized in the Arabian Peninsula.

It was dark, bitter, and people couldn't get enough of it.

From its simple origins, over the centuries that has spread around the world to become one of the most

popular beverages in history. Today you can find it being served almost everywhere

including specialty stores built entirely around its consumption. Learn more about coffee, once called the Devil's Drink,

on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. The true origin of the coffee plant isn't known for certain.

However, the consensus is that it probably came from the highlands of Ethiopia.

In fact, the Ethiopians have a legend about the discovery of coffee.

Supposedly, a ninth century goatherder named Kaldi from the Kafa region of Ethiopia

was watching over as goats when they began eating the beans off certain trees.

He found that his goats wouldn't sleep and became hyperactive after eating the beans.

He told a local abbot of a monastery about what he discovered and the abbot went out and created a beverage from the beans.

He found that the drink kept him alert while doing his evening prayers and thus coffee was born.

There is another legend from Yemen that holds that a doctor named

Sheikh Omar from the city of Mocha was sent into exile in a cave in the mountains.

There he saw the berries of the coffee plant and tried to eat them.

The berries were too bitter so he put them in a fire hoping it would take the bitterness away.

Having been roasted, they were now too hard to eat so he put them in boiling water to soften them and the result was

coffee. We have no idea how true these legends are but even if they aren't true they do make

for a good story. The real story of coffee begins in the 15th century in

Yemen. If you look at a map there's a very short distance between the Horn of

Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Known as the Bob L Mandeb, it's only 31 miles or 50 kilometers across.

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