The British custom of afternoon tea is generally credited to Anna Maria Russell, the 7th Duchess of Bedford, in the early 1840s. She popularised the habit of taking tea with light food between lunch and a late evening dinner, and it spread quickly among the Victorian upper classes.
The key figure
Most historians attribute the “invention” of afternoon tea to Anna, Duchess of Bedford, one of Queen Victoria’s ladies-in-waiting. Feeling hungry in the long gap before a fashionable 8–9 p.m. dinner, she began requesting tea, bread, butter, and cakes around 4–5 p.m. and inviting friends to join her.
From habit to national custom
What began as the Duchess’s personal solution to mid-afternoon hunger became a social occasion copied by other aristocratic households. As tea drinking was already prestigious in Britain, this new afternoon ritual was quickly adopted and evolved into the formal “afternoon tea” associated with tiered stands, sandwiches, scones, and cakes.
