Black gold

Published November 27, 2016

“In medieval times the habit arose of expressing a man’s wealth, no longer in terms of the amount of land in his estate, but of the amount of pepper in his pantry. One way of saying that a man was poor was to say that he lacked pepper. The wealthy kept large stores of pepper in their houses, and let it be known that it was there: it was a guarantee of solvency.” — Waverley Root, author of The Food of Italy

Legend has it that when the Romans seized Carthage (near modern-day Tunis) in 416 BCE they burned it to the ground and covered it with salt. This ‘salting the earth’ was an ancient ritual in the Near East which symbolised the placing of a curse on the conquered city thus rendering it inhabitable.

Black pepper was never known to be involved in any such indignity even though black peppercorns were the principal import of the Roman Empire. So many ships were dedicated to the business of their procurement that by the fourth century pepper ceased to be a luxury and became a domestic staple instead. It was even omitted from the Alexandria Manifest — a list of dutiable luxury items entering through the port of Alexandria in Egypt. White peppercorns, however, remained firmly on the list.


Why the black pepper on your spice rack is nothing to sneeze at


Not all Romans were enamoured of the money and manpower spent on the import of this spicy good. In his landmark multi-volume work, Natural History, Pliny the Elder complained about it quite plainly: “It is quite surprising that the use of pepper has come so much into fashion, seeing that in other substances which we use, it is sometimes their sweetness, and sometimes their appearance that has attracted our notice; whereas, pepper has nothing in it that can plead as a recommendation to either fruit or berry, its only desirable quality being a certain pungency; and yet it is for this that we import it all the way from India! Who was the first to make trial of it as an article of food? And who, I wonder, was the man that was not content to prepare himself by hunger only for the satisfying of a greedy appetite?”

After the fall of the Roman Empire the pepper trail was disrupted causing it to become scarce and therefore precious once again. So precious in fact that it ceased to be valued for its flavour and more as an economic commodity. During the Middle Ages wealth was estimated by the amount of pepper in a nobleman’s pantry rather than the gold in his vault. Bags of black peppercorn were passed on in dowries and estates of the wealthy. Salaries were paid with it and in France it was not uncommon to bribe judges with pepper.

In the late 13th century Marco Polo noted with obvious envy that for each shipment of pepper heading to Europe at least 10 were sailing towards China. The Sultanate of Aceh in Sumatra, Indonesia and the coastal region of Malabar in southern India provided the world’s supply of black pepper.

Arab spice merchants managed to monopolise the trade for many years by keeping the sea routes secret and telling fantastic tales about the source (such as high mountains guarded by winged dragons). The game was officially over in 1497 when four Portuguese sea vessels commanded by Vasco da Gama arrived at the port of Calicut, India.

Pepper retained its status as the mainstay of the spice trade and its only bulk commodity. In the 16th century almost 80 per cent of all spice imports carried by Portuguese ships consisted of black peppercorns; the same was the case with Dutch and English vessels in the 17th century.


During the Middle Ages wealth was estimated by the amount of pepper in a nobleman’s pantry rather than the gold in his vault. Bags of black peppercorn were passed on in dowries and estates of the wealthy. Salaries were paid with it and in France it was not uncommon to bribe judges with pepper.


This resulted in a dramatic increase in the supply of pepper in European markets so that even the most humble table boasted a pot of peppery powder. Even with the lowered price, ground black pepper adulterated with charcoal powder or ground black mustard seeds (among other things) was so common in London that the real thing was usually returned to the merchant for being too strong.

The newly independent United States of America entered the pepper trade in 1797 when Captain Jonathan Carnes of Salem, Massachusetts returned home from Sumatra with 158,544 pounds of it shovelled into his ship’s hold. Records show that he sold his cargo for 37 cents a pound and made a grand profit of almost 700 per cent.

Very little of the sold pepper was consumed by the Americans themselves; the majority of it was re-exported to markets in Europe in order to purchase French wines and other luxury items. With eight million pounds of pepper passing through its port each year, Salem soon became an important centre for the trade for black pepper, offering stiff competition to both London and Amsterdam. Besides the temptation for revenue, American traders were fuelled by a desire to compete with and defeat British competitors. In the early 1800s, tax money raised by the import of black pepper paid for five per cent of all US government expenses.

Not long after, in around 1826, in the nearby city of Philadelphia, Reverend Sylvester Graham, a dietary reformer best known for his emphasis on vegetarianism, warned that the excessive use of black pepper could lead to insanity. So far no well-known case has come to light that can verify the reverend’s claim, but just to be safe insist on freshly ground pepper the next time you eat out. There’s no telling to where the consumption of charcoal powder may lead.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, November 27th, 2016

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