There is one edible variety of ginger, Zingiber officinale, which originated in China over 5000 years ago. The history of ginger’s migration around the globe is as exotic as the beliefs in the spice itself. The prized ginger rhizome has been used as a medicine in Asian, Indian, and Arabic herbal traditions since ancient times. During the Roman Empire, ginger was a coveted and expensive spice reserved for nobility and commanded a price fifteen times that of black pepper. It is believed that ginger originally arrived in Rome from India. After the fall of the Roman Empire, ginger nearly disappeared in Europe.
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