SC - Spices?

[Marian Deborah Rosenberg]

Greetings,

  I've found something odd that perhaps the list can explain to me.  From page
142 "Women, Production and Patriarchy in Late Medieval Cities" by Martha Howell
...

There is a table of "approximate wholesale values of leading spices inmported
into Cologne 1452-59"

with prices

Ingwer, pfeffer, melzzucker, brotzucker, kassuyn, lorbeer, kummel, zimt,
muskat, muskatbluten, reis, safran, datteln, nelken, mandeln 

or

Ginger, pepper, sugar, sugar, sugar, bay, caraway, cinnamon, nutmeg, mace,
*rice*, saffron, dates, cloves, almonds.

Since when was rice become a spice?

- -M