Black Pepper (Piper nigrum); Coffee (Coffea arabica), a botanical study, Company School, circa 1795

This botanical study shows two separate plants, the Black pepper with the drooping leaves in the lower half of the painting, and the coffee plant with the more erect, slender leaves at the top of the painting.

The Black Pepper plant (Piper Nigrum) is native to India and the pepper corns derived from it have been used as a spice in Indian cooking for millenia. It remains probably the most widespread spice in all cuisines to this day. The word pepper is derived from the Sanskrit pipali.

The Coffee plant (Coffea Arabica) is native to South-West Arabia and has been drunk both as a tisane of leaves and as a brew from the  roasted beans for well over a thousand years. Its popularity spread through the Mamluk and Ottoman empires, and it was cultivated in South and South-East Asia as early as the 17th century.