Tracing the history of tea cultivation in Boseong back far enough, there is a record suggesting that tea was already in use here around 1,600 years ago, during the period when Bokhol-gun — Boseong's old name — was being incorporated from the Mahan confederacy into the kingdom of Baekje. But a considerable span of time separates this ancient record from the tea-field landscape most people picture today when they think of Boseong. The scenery of today's tea gardens actually began during the period of Japanese colonial rule.
In 1939, Japanese tea specialists identified this region as the most suitable location in Korea for growing black tea. The following year, in 1940, seeds of an Indian tea variety called "Benihomare" were imported and sown across 29.7 hectares of farmland — the true beginning of today's Boseong tea gardens. A record from an almost unimaginably distant 1,600 years ago and a beginning from a comparatively recent 80-plus years ago thus overlap within this single landscape today. It is also worth remembering, when viewing this landscape, that these tea fields were established within the specific historical context of Japanese colonial rule.