I don’t know who wrote that history, but this:
“Fact: Chile peppers were used in Cervantes’s Spain and show up in great ancient cuisines of China, India, Indonesia, Italy, the Caribbean, France, and the Arab states.”
Unless by “ancient” is meant about 600 years ago, this is impossible, since Chiles, like potatoes and corn, are New World vegetables, unknown in all those places before 1400.
Hank