“Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea,” wrote Henry James in “The Portrait of a Lady.” “Teatime” is one ...

But there is more to teatime than cucumber sandwiches with “Downton’s” Dowager Countess of Grantham, and pots of tea on the ceiling with giggling uncles in “Mary Poppins.” This is a complex beast, ...

It began with a rumbling stomach, or so the story goes. One afternoon in 1840, at around 4 p.m. Anna Russell, the duchess of Bedford, complained of a “sinking feeling,” according to the British Museum ...