Important Events in History of Pepper
80 B.C. | Alexandria, Egypt becomes the greatest spice trading port of Eastern Mediterranean, with one of its entrances known as "Pepper Gate". |
410 A.D. | Alaric the Visigoth demands 3000 pounds of peppers as ransom from Rome and two years later extracts 300 pounds annual pepper tribute from the city. |
1494 | Columbus' physician, Chanca, describes Mexican Capsicums. |
1498 | Vasco de Gama reaches Calicut, India, the spice center; pepper prices fall in Europe. |
1563 | Garcia da Orta writes "Colloquies on Drugs and Simples of India" the first scientific book on oriental spices published in the western world. |
1672 | Elihu Yale reaches India and starts spice business which eventually provides the fortune with which he founded Yale University. |
1797 | Captain Jonathan Carnes of Salem, Massachusetts, returns from Sumatra with first large pepper cargo and puts United States in world spice trade. |
1805 | U.S. reaches peak of its Sumatra pepper trade; re-exports alone totalled 7,000,000 pounds in one year. |
1835 | English settlers in Texas originate chili powder as a convenient way of making Mexican type dishes. |
1873 | Piracy and native hostility finally end America's direct pepper trade with Sumatra and the last of the 967 pepper voyages is completed. |
1910 | California begins chili pepper production. |
1937 | Professor Szent Gyorgyi wins Nobel Prize for research with paprika, in which he discovers Vitamin C. |
1976 | World trade in black pepper sets an all time high of 220 million pounds. |