Long Pepper - Piper longum

Common Names: Long Pepper, Indian Long Pepper, Thippali, Chavica longa, Chavica roxburghii, Chavica sarmentosa, Piper roxburghii, pipala, pipal, pipar, pipli, hipli, hippali, pippali (Sanskrit and Ayurveda), modi, pipul, peepul, darfilfi, pipo, Poivre long (French), Langer Pfeffer (German), Peperi makron (Greek), Pepe lunga (Italian), Long pepper (global, English), Ralli, Tippilli, Pipal, Pitroat, Piper longum (Latin, international scientific name)

Latin Name: Piper longum

Origin: Asia

Short Introduction

The natural habitat of Long Pepper includes various types of semi-deciduous and evergreen forests, thriving at elevations up to 1,500 meters above sea level.

Long Pepper plants flourish in humid tropical climates, with summer temperatures ranging from 30–40°C and winter temperatures of 4–10°C, accompanied by average annual rainfall of 2,000–3,500 mm.

This plant prefers shaded areas, making it ideal for regions experiencing heavy rainfall with high relative humidity.

To fertilize, add about 100 g of dried cow dung or well-rotted organic manure to each planting pit and mix well with the soil. Shortly after the onset of the local monsoon rains, two rooted stem cuttings or shoots (8–10 cm in length) are planted in each pit. Watering is done every other day.

The plant starts producing spikes six months after planting. The pepper fruits are usually harvested just before full maturity, when they are at their most pungent and are black-green in color. If left unharvested, the fruits ripen further, losing much of their heat. Thick parts of the stem and roots can be harvested 18 months after planting.

Detailed Description

A flavorful Asian spice with intriguing therapeutic qualities.

Botanical Information

Long Pepper is a dioecious, woody, climbing flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, which is typically dried and used as a spice. Long Pepper resembles black, white, and green pepper in taste but is distinctly hotter.

Species in the genus Piper include herbs, shrubs, lianas, and, rarely, trees. Long Pepper’s leaves are alternate, long-petioled, simple, lobed, ovate to lanceolate, up to 12 cm long and 3–12 cm wide, and have stipules. Its sessile flowers form spikes, occasionally racemes.

The fruit is a small, spherical, sessile drupe (technically a berry), about 2 mm in diameter, and may be red or yellow. Each pepper fruit spike is made up of many minuscule individual fruits (each poppy seed-sized), resembling the catkins of the hazel tree.

Origin and Distribution

Piper species are almost pantropical, mainly found in lowland tropical forests, but some can grow outside forested areas. Certain species even occur in southern Japan and Korea’s subtropical zones.

Long Pepper originally spanned nearly the entire Indian subcontinent, from the Himalayan foothills to the southern tip of India, as well as Nepal, Bhutan, and Sri Lanka. It was later cultivated in Vietnam and Malaysia.

Usage / Dosage

The word ‘pepper’ is derived from ‘pippali,’ the Sanskrit name for Long Pepper. Its earliest known mention is in ancient Indian Ayurvedic texts, where its culinary and healing uses are detailed. The plant reached Ancient Greece in the 6th or 5th century BCE—Hippocrates even described Long Pepper as a remedy rather than just a spice.

Spice Use

Long Pepper has been used in cuisine as far back as 7000 BCE, with its berries discovered in ancient Thailand, likely wild-harvested rather than cultivated.

The leaves are locally known as ‘uziza’ and flavor Nigerian stews. In Mexico and Central America, a similar spice known as hoja santa is used for flavoring traditional dishes.

Among the Greeks, Romans, and throughout the Middle Ages, Long Pepper was prized and widely recognized. While it was frequently blended into medieval spice mixes like ‘strong powder,’ today it is relatively rare in European kitchens. However, it remains popular in Indian and Nepalese vegetable broths, some North African spice blends, as well as Indonesian and Malaysian cuisines.

Cultural Significance

Many Piper species are still grown as ornamental plants in tropical and subtropical gardens. Others, like Piper magnificum, grow as large, dense, and attractive shrubs.

Deforestation threatens several Piper species—for example, over ten species in Ecuador are endangered. On the other hand, human activity has spread some species globally, with a few even becoming invasive.

Ayurveda

In traditional Ayurvedic medicine, Long Pepper is a popular remedy for headaches, toothaches, and respiratory and digestive issues (such as loss of appetite or intestinal parasites), also noted for its antiseptic properties. In folk medicine, dried unripe fruits are often used as an alternative tonic.

Decoctions of unripe fruits and roots are used for chronic bronchitis, coughs, and colds. Roots and fruits are traditionally applied as antidotes to snake bites and scorpion stings. A mix of powdered Embelia ribes seeds, Piper longum fruit, and borax powder forms a traditional Ayurvedic contraceptive.

Decoctions of the roots are also administered for joint swellings in livestock in northwestern Himalayan regions.

Therapeutic Effects

Long Pepper fruit essential oils display insecticidal and repellent properties. Piperidine alkaloids such as pipernonaline and piperoctadecalidine, isolated from the fruits, have shown insecticidal activity against several arthropod pests.

Smooth Muscle Spasms

Extracts from the fruits and roots of Piper longum have demonstrated spasmolytic (antispasmodic) activity, reducing intestinal contractions in animal studies, alongside conventional antidiarrheals and calcium channel blockers.

Platelet Aggregation

Long Pepper contains components that inhibit blood platelet aggregation. Acidamides such as piperine, pipernonaline, piperoctadecalidin, and piperlongumin isolated from the fruit have shown dose-dependent inhibition of collagen-induced platelet aggregation and other mediators.

Antioxidant Properties

Extracts from dried Piper longum fruits were found to have considerable antihyperglycemic, antioxidant, and lipid peroxidation-reducing effects in diabetic rats—comparable to standard pharmaceutical glibenclamide.

Among various tested herbs and spices, antioxidant potency ranked: Piper nigrum > Piper longum > Cyperus rotundus > Plumbago zeylanica > Zingiber officinale.

Cholesterol

Methylpiperine from Long Pepper significantly inhibited total serum cholesterol elevation and improved HDL/total cholesterol ratio in animal studies.

Analgesic Effect

An aqueous suspension of powdered Long Pepper root, administered orally to mice and rats, demonstrated moderate opioid-like, but strong analgesic and anti-inflammatory activity. Decoctions likewise showed anti-inflammatory activity against induced swelling in animal tests.

Depression

Piperine, a piperidine alkaloid extracted from Long Pepper fruit, exhibited potent antidepressant effects, partly through monoamine oxidase (MAO) inhibition.

Ulcers

A decoction combining ginger and Long Pepper protected against gastric ulcers in animal experiments.

Antimicrobial Activity

Essential oils from Long Pepper fruits showed significant fungicidal effects against several plant pathogenic fungi (e.g., Pyricularia oryzae, Rhizoctonia solani, Botrytis cinerea, Phytophthora infestans, Puccinia recondita, Erysiphe graminis). The piperidine alkaloid pipernonaline proved especially potent against P. recondita.

Crude fruit extracts offered strong antiamebic activity against Entamoeba histolytica, comparable to standard medication. Both roots and fruits showed antiamebic effects. Various Long Pepper extracts also displayed antibacterial properties against many pathogenic bacteria, performing well in comparison to streptomycin.

Respiratory System

Piperine demonstrated central stimulatory effects in animals—attenuating morphine- or pentobarbital-induced respiratory depression. Extracts stimulated respiration at low doses and suppressed the esophageal ciliary movement, likely explaining some cough-suppressant effects. Fruit extracts relieved passive skin anaphylaxis and antigen-induced bronchospasm in rats.

Hepatoprotective Activity

Fruit extracts promoted liver tissue regeneration by limiting fibrosis, with additional significant protection against liver toxicity both in vitro and in vivo, primarily due to piperine.

Anticancer Properties

Piperine reduced the formation of lung metastases in melanoma cell models in mice (by up to 95.2%) and protected against the harmful effects of secondary toxins. Piperine exhibited pronounced chemoprotective effects in animal models of lung cancer.

Piplartine and piperine alkaloid-amides demonstrated cytotoxicity against tumor cell lines. Piperine is known for antioxidant, anti-apoptotic, and regenerative capabilities, limiting harmful cellular proliferation and mutations.

Safety

Widely used in cuisine and traditional medicine, Long Pepper is generally considered safe in moderate amounts. Experimental models, however, show that its fruit has contraceptive effects, and it is advised to avoid Long Pepper during pregnancy and breastfeeding. A dose of 1 g/kg body weight was found effective for contraception in animal studies, with no toxic or teratogenic effect observed.

Studies on acute and chronic toxicity of ethanol extracts from Piper longum fruit found no significant mortality versus control.

Active Components

Long Pepper fruits contain volatile oils, starch, proteins, alkaloids, saponins, carbohydrates, and amygdalin. The seeds contain sylvatin and dieudesmin, while fatty acids from crushed seeds include palmitic, hexadecenoic, stearic, linoleic, oleic, arachidic, and behenic acids.

Main alkaloids include piperine (the most abundant), methylpiperine, iperonaline, piperettine, asarinin, pelitorine, piperundecalidine, piperlongumine, piperlonguminine, refractamide A, pregumidine, brachystamide, brachystamide-A, brachystin, pipercide, piperdine, longamide, tetrahydropiperine, piperlongumin, dehydropipernonaline, and others.

Lignans identified include sesamin, pulvuatol, and fargesin. Fruits also contain esters like tridecyl-dihydrocoumarate, eicosanyl-(E)-p-coumarate, and Z-12-octadecenyl-glycerol-monoester.

Its essential oil is a complex blend, mainly (beside volatile piperine) caryophyllene and pentadecane (each about 17.8%), and bisabolene (11%). Other constituents are thujone, terpinolene, zingiberene, p-cymene, p-methoxyacetophenone, and dihydrocarveol. It contains less essential oil (about 1%) than its relatives, mainly composed of sesquiterpene hydrocarbons and ethers (bisabolene, β-caryophyllene, β-caryophyllene oxide—each 10–20%; α-zingiberene 5%), and saturated aliphatic hydrocarbons like 18% pentadecane, 7% tridecane, 6% heptadecane.

GC-MS analysis has identified over 15 volatile constituents, including compounds such as pipatalin, pelitorine, sesamin, brachystamide B, and guineensine.

Traditional Dosage

Ayurvedic use recommends powdered Long Pepper at 0.5–1 g once or several times daily, typically after meals. Individual fruits may be used in folk medicine at a dose of 3–5 g once or twice daily, 10 minutes before meals. It may be dispensed with milk or clarified butter (ghee).