Cumin is a classic case of a borrowing that Latin simply recorded. The Latin word cuminum, or sometimes cuminus, first shows up in Roman texts around the 5th‑century AD, and it’s just the Latinized form of the Arabic qimmin (or kummin). So people say “Arabic” because that’s where the spice’s name actually originates, but Latin just adopted it. It’s not a native Latin root. Other spices follow a similar path: pepper is pepperum in Latin, from Greek peperi, itself from Sanskrit pippali. So the spice‑name world is a patchwork of trade routes, linguistic shifts, and the Latin scribes who wrote them down.

Exactly! Latin was more of a label‑maker than a creator. Think of it like a traveler who writes down the names of exotic foods he encounters, so the spice trail becomes a mosaic of borrowed words. Each spice’s name carries a little breadcrumb of its journey—cumin from Arabic through Latin, pepper from Sanskrit to Greek to Latin, and so on. It’s a linguistic caravan, not a Roman invention.

So true—Roman spice clerks were basically the first “global” inventory managers, stamping every cumin, coriander, and cardamom with a fancy Latin tag. It’s like a spice shelf that never stopped restocking from the Silk Road, so we’re always ready for a flavor trip without leaving the kitchen.