Pepper

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Ibn Battuta had the following to say about pepper:

"Description of pepper. The pepper-trees resemble grape-vines; they are planted alongside coco-palms and climb up them in the same way that vines climb, except that they have no shoots, that is to say tendrils, like those of vines. The leaves of the trees resemble (77) those of stocks [or, according to a variant reading, horses' ears], and some of them resemble the leaves of briar. It produces its fruit in small clusters, the grains of which resemble the grains of abu qinninah[1] when they are green. In the autumn they gather the grains and spread them on mats in the sun, just as is done with grapes in order to obtain raisins; they keep on turning them until they are thoroughly dried and become black, and then sell them to the merchants. Most people in our country suppose that they roast them with fire and that it is because of that they become crinkled, but it is not so since this results only from the action of the sun upon them. I have seen pepper grains in the city of Qaliqut being poured out for measuring by the bushel, like millet in our country."

[1] I.e. the date palm, Phoenix dactylifera, L. The word qinnina, 'flask', is used in the Sahara for a semispherical scoop made from the wood of the date palm, which is therefore called the 'father of the scoop'.

- The Travels of Ibn Battuta, 1327, Vol. IV