The pepper is the seed or fruit of a tree or shrub which grows in the southern part of the Caucasus mountains, facing the burning heat of the sun, as Isidore says in book 17 [Etymologies 17.8]. Its leaves are similar to the juniper. Serpents guard the forests it grows in, but the inhabitants of the region where the forests grow naturally set fire to them, and the serpents flee the fire's violence, and from this burning the seeds of the pepper, which started out white, are accidentally turned black and wrinkled.

There are three forms, as the same man says; there is the long pepper, namely when it is immature, and white pepper, namely when it is unchanged by the fire, and black pepper, namely when it is black and red on its surface from the scorching heat of the fire. Black pepper keeps its strength for a longer time than the others, and can be stored securely.

Et quanto est ponderosius, tanto est recentius et etiam melius, ut dicit idem. Sophisticatur autem mercatorum fraude, nam vetustissimo piperi humefacto, super aspergunt spumam argenti vel plumbi, ut sic videatur ratione ponderis esse recens. Huc usque Isidorus.

Plinius autem, libro 12 capite 8 [Naturalis historia 12.26], dicit quod piper per longam adustionem solis nigrum redditur et rugosum, et hoc non sine piperis iniuria, cum deberet esse album, sed ex coeli intemperie sic nigrescit, hoc etiam permittunt incolae, ut possit diutius et melius conservari.

Dioscorides [De materia medica 2.159] dicit quod Saraceni, quando de novo colligitur, illud ponunt in clibano, et sic torrent, ut virtus germinativa a pipere auferatur, ne in aliis partibus valeat fructificare aut iterum pullulare.

Piper itaque granum est vile in spectu exterius atque nigrum, interius album, sapore acutum, odore aromaticum, in quantitate modicum, in virtute maximum, actu frigidum, potentia calidissimum, cuius virtus non sentitur quamdiu est integrum, sed cum masticatum fuerit vel contritum.

Cuius virtutes dicere ad plenum esset longum, et quamvis sit multum ponderosum apud nos preciosumque propter eius raritatem et efficaciam, apud Indos tamen propter eius copiam pulegio vilius reputatur.