Black chickpea were used by peasant families as a major source of protein and iron in the past few decades, when poverty made the consumption of animal meat very rare.
This chickpeas is a variety that is very resistant to adversity, never sprinkled, does not fear cold and drought.
Of course, today it is no longer cultivated by hand but with sowing and mechanical harvesting, except for a few farmers who sow chickpeas among the almond and olive groves, to exploit the fertilizing properties of legumes. This characteristic variety of chickpeas originates from south Italy. 
The black chickpea is different in form and color from the common chaotic sultan: this local ecotype has a much smaller grain-shaped form with its wrinkled and irregular skin, the apex in the shape of a hook, Very tasty and rich in fiber (three times as much in a common chickpea) and iron. Thanks to its high concentration of iron, it was recommended in the past to pregnant women. It has never had a flourishing market, also because its consistent skin requires a 12 hour soaking time and a cooking time of about two hours.
The consumption of black chickpea was linked to an ancient local tradition, which remained alive until the early 1960s. At the birth of every child, it was customary to warn the pastor, bringing him a hen. To draw on the mother from the fatigue of childbirth and subsequent breastfeeding, they prepared her broth of black chickpeas, the black baking liquid as oil and gelatinous but very nutritious. With the economic boom of the 1960s, the abandonment of farmers' lands for industries, but above all with the finding that it was more appropriate for the hen to eat the puerpera, the black chickpea risked being extinguished, an event which had been overthrown by a few stubborn peasants.