Origin, distribution and botany of pepper (Piper nigrum L.)
1986
Sim, S.L. (Jabatan Pertanian, Kuching, Sarawak (Malaysia))
Pepper originated in the hills of South Western India. Although pepper was found cultivated in Indonesia as early as the 13th Century and in Sri Lanka and Cambodia in the 18th Century, India remained as the centre of pepper cultivation till the early 19th Century when large number of pepper holdings were established in Malaysia and later in Brazil. Pepper plant is a perennial woody climber. The orthotropic stems cling firmly to their supports with adventitious roots arising from the nodes. The plagiotropic branches bear inflorescences and fruit spikes. The leaves are simple, alternate and stipulate. The leaf blade is ovate, entire and coriaceous. The leaf base is oblique, obtuse or cordate and the tip acuminate. The inflorescence is a catkin-like spike having 50 to 120 flowers. The flowers may be hermaphrodite or unisexual. The hermaphrodite flower has two stamens on either sides of the ovary. The style is absent or very short and the stigma has 3 to 5 fleshy branches. The fruit is a sessile globose drupe. The commercial black pepper corn is the dried whole fruit and the white pepper corn the seed of pepper. The bisexual flower is protogynous. Though protogyny suggests cross pollination, experimental evidences seem to indicate pepper is a self-pollinated plant. Geitonogamy is believed to be the common mode of pollination.
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