Cloves have been long known to the Chinese. Mr. Mayers, late Chinese Secretary to the British Legation at Pekin, has communicated to us the interesting fact that they are mentioned by several Chinese writers as in use under the Han dynasty, b.c. 266 to a.d. 220, during which period it was customary for the officers of the court to hold the spice in the mouth before addressing the sovereign, in order that their breath might have an agreeable odour.[1074]
The Sanskrit name is “Lavanga,” whence the vernacular Hindustani “Laung.”
The first European author to mention Caryophyllon is Pliny, who describes it, after pepper, as a grain resembling that spice but longer and more brittle, produced in India, and imported for the sake of its odour. It is doubtful whether this description really refers to cloves.
By the 4th century, cloves must have become well known in Europe, if credence can be placed in a remarkable record preserved by Vignoli,[1075] which states that the emperor Constantine presented to St. Silvester, bishop of Rome, a.d. 314-335, numerous vessels of gold and silver, incense and spices, among which last were 150 pounds of Cloves—a vast quantity for the period.
Kosmas Indicopleustes,[1076] in his Topographia Christiana written about a.d. 547, states in the account of Taprobane (Ceylon) that silk, aloes [-wood], cloves (Καρυόϕυλλον) and sandal-wood, besides other productions, are imported thither from China, and other emporia, and transmitted to distant regions. Alexander Trallianus,[1077] who was a friend of Kosmos and a pupil of his father, prescribed in several receipts 5 or 8 cloves, καρυοϕυλλου κόκκους, from which fact it may be inferred that at his time (at Rome?) cloves were a very rare article. A century later, Paulus Ægineta[1078] distinctly described cloves as Caryophyllon—ex India, veluti flores cujusdam arboris.. odorati, acres ... and much used for a condiment and in medicine.
In the beginning of the 8th century, the same spice is noticed by Benedictus Crispus,[1079] archbishop of Milan, who calls it Cariophylus ater; and in a.d. 716, it is enumerated with other commodities in the diploma granted by Chilperic II. to the monastery of Corbie in Normandy.[1080]
We find cloves among the wares on which duty was levied at Acon (the modern Acre) in Palestine at the end of the 12th century, at which period that city was a great emporium of Mediterranean trade.[1081] They are likewise enumerated in the tariff of Marseilles of a.d. 1228,[1082] in that of Barcelona of 1252[1083] and of Paris, 1296.[1084]
These facts show that the spice was a regular object of commerce at this period. But it was very costly: the Household Book of the Countess of Leicester, a.d. 1265,[1085] gives its price as 10s. to 12s. per lb., exactly the same as that of saffron. Several other examples of the high cost of the spice might be adduced.
Of the place of growth of cloves, the first distinct notice seems to be that of the Arabian geographer Ibn Khurdádbah,[1086] a.d. 869-885, who names the spice, with cocoa-nuts, sugar, and sandal-wood as produced in Java. Doubtless he was misinformed, for the clove-tree had not come so far west at that period. Marco Polo[1087] made the same mistake four centuries later: finding the spice in Java, he supposed it the growth of the island.
Nicolo Conti,[1088] a Venetian merchant who lived from a.d. 1424 to 1448 in the Indian Archipelago, learned that cloves are brought to Java from the island of Banda, fifteen days’ sail further east. With the arrival of the Portuguese at the commencement of the 16th century, more accurate accounts of the Spice Islands began to reach Europe; and Pigafetta,[1089] the companion of Magellan, gave a very good description of the clove-tree as he observed it in 1521.