spices; it was the first thing asked for by "Glutton" in Piers Plowman (V, 310–13):
| " | I haue gode ale, gossib," quod she "glotown, wiltow assaye?" |
| " | Hastow aughte in thi purs any hote spices?" |
| " | I haue peper and piones," quod she "and a pounde of garlike, |
| A ferthyngworth of fenel-seed for fastyngdayes." |
Friar Odoric (Chap. iii) describes the pepper production of "Minibar" as follows: "the wood in which it grows containeth in circuit eighteen days' journey. And in the said wood or forest there are two cities, one called Flandrina, and the other Cyncilim" (probably Nelcynda). "In the aforesaid wood pepper is had after this manner: first it groweth in leaves like unto pot-herbs, which they plant near unto great trees as we do our vines, and they bring forth pepper in clusters, as our vines do yield grapes, but being ripe, they are of a green color, and are gathered as we gather grapes, and then the grains are laid in the sun to be dried, and being dried are put into earthen vessels; and thus is pepper made and kept. . . At the south end of the said forests stands the city of Polumbrum, which aboundeth with merchandise of all kinds." (The proper form would be Polumbum, the Latinized version of Polum or Kolum, the modern Quilon. P and K are interchanged here as in the case of Karūr, the modern Parūr.)
Tavernier found pepper sold principally at Tuticorin and Calicut. Some, however, came from Rājāpur on the Ratnāgiri coast. "The Dutch," he says (II, xii. Ball's ed.), "who purchase it from the Malabaris do not pay in cash for it, but exchange for it many kinds of merchandise, as cotton, opium, vermilion, and quicksilver, and it is this pepper which is exported to Europe. . . . 500 livres of it brings only 38 reals, but on the merchandise which they give in exchange they gain 100 per cent. One can get it for the equivalent in money of 28 or 30 reals cash, but to purchase it in that way would be much more costly than the Dutch method."
He mentions also (I, xvi) a large storehouse kept by the Portuguese at Cochin, called the "Pepper House."
See also Watt, 896–901;—Flükiger and Hanbury, Pharmacographia, p. 579;—Encyclopaedia Britannica, article "Pepper;"—Brandis, Indian Trees;—Vignoli, Liber Pontificalis, Rome, 1724–55.
Odoric also describes a propitiation of the serpents guarding the pepper, similar to those of the frankincense and diamond; the story is better in the version of "Sir John Mandeville" (Chap. xviii): "In that country be many manner of serpents and of other vermin for the great heat of the country and the pepper. And some men say,
