No single person “invented” pies; they developed gradually in several ancient cultures, especially in Egypt, Greece, and Rome.

Ancient origins

Archaeological and textual evidence suggests that early pie‑like dishes began in ancient Egypt as flat cakes of ground grains (often called galettes) filled with honey and sometimes nuts or fruits. These were more like edible containers or cakes than modern pastry pies, but they establish Egypt as one of the earliest known sources of pie‑style foods.

The Greeks later developed a more recognisable pastry by mixing flour, water, and fat into a dough that could wrap meats or fruits, bringing pies closer to the modern idea of a filled pastry crust. The Romans adopted and expanded these techniques, using hard crusts mainly as containers to bake and preserve savory fillings such as meats and seafood, often discarding the crust itself.

Medieval “pie” and the word

In medieval England, enclosed meat pastries called “pyes” became common by at least the 12th–14th centuries, and the word “pie” as an English term appears around this time. Early English pies often had very thick, sometimes inedible crusts (called “coffyns”) used primarily as baking vessels and storage cases rather than as part of the meal.

Fruit pies emerged later, around the 1500s, with English tradition crediting the first cherry pie to the court of Queen Elizabeth I, reflecting how pies had shifted from purely utilitarian meat containers to sweet desserts as well. From there, European settlers carried pie traditions to the Americas, adapting them to local ingredients like apples and pumpkins and giving rise to many of the classic pies familiar today.