SPICES Introduction
 

A few fascinating highlights from the history of the spice trade in the Arab world.

• 2600 to 2100 B.C. The first authentic records of uses of spices and herbs. Onions and garlic were fed to 100,000 laborers who toiled in the construction of the Great Pyramid of Cheops. These medicinal herbs were believed to preserve their health.

• 2000 to 1000 B.C. Arabia prospered almost beyond belief as the great monopolistic carrier of goods between East and West. Frankincense, a tree resin harvested like American maple syrup, was Arabia,s most valuable product. Grown in the (Incense Route), first on primitive donkey caravans, then by dromedary camel.

• Myrrh was especially coveted by the ancient Egyptians for fumigation in their temples and for embalming puposes. It was produced from the gum resin of a small tree indigenous to southern Arabia, Abyssinia, and the land of Punt (the coast of modern Somalia).

• The upper classes in Egypt fumigated their homes with incense to ward off foul odors. In recent years it has been proven that the burning of incense produces phenol(carbolic acid), which is an antiseptic.

• 1550 B.C. The 2 meter long Ebers Papyrus lists 800 medicinal drugs including the following spices: anise caraway, cassia, coriander, cardamon, onion, garlic, perfumes, aromatic oils, cooking, and fumigation.

• 1485 B.C. Queen Hatshepsut, Pharaoh of Egypt, dispatched an expedition of five ships to Punt, to bring back myrrh trees to plant in a garden of the new temple to the god Amon. The ships returned with 31 cherished myrrh trees suspended in slings, along with ivory, ebony, gold, silver, and cinnamon.

• Genesis 37:25. Joseph,s brothers (sat down to eat. Looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Galaad, their camels Iaden with spices, balm, myrrh, with which they were on their way down to Egypt.

• The geographic location of the Arabs made them natural middlemen in the spice trade, and they protected their monopoly by pretending that cassia and cinnamon came from Africa, thereby discouraging other importers from contracting the original Chinese and Indian sources.

• 450 B.C. The Greek historian Herodotus learned from the Arabs that cinnamon was harvested on remote Arabian mountain peaks Large birds were said to carry the cinnamon twigs to their inaccessible nests. To harvest the cinnamon, large pieces of meat were supposedly placed near the nests. When the birds carried the meat up to the nests, they collapsed under the weights, and the natives would run to collect the cinnamon, which was very expensive due to its scarcity and the alleged dangers of harvest.

• 711 A.D. During the conquest of Spain, and the glorious centuries of Arab rule that followed, orange, rice, and numerous spices were carried by the Arabs to Europe.

• 850 A.D. Coffee, the(wine of Islam), was discovered, in Ethiopia, when a goatherd noticed that his animals were getting high on the berries of the tree now known as Coffea Arabica. By the middle of the sixteenth century, coffee had reached Turkey and spread immediately to Europe, where it was immensely popular.

• 1000-1200 A.D. The Crusaders carried pomegranates, apricots, tarragon, and mint back to Europe.
  

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