[3] The ancient Egyptians' diet featured basic pies made from oat, wheat, rye, and barley, filled with honey and baked over hot coals.

The Romans adopted the Greek creations, using a variety of meats, oysters, mussels, lampreys, and fish as filling and a mixture of flour, oil, and water for the crust.

Between 1387 and 1400, Geoffrey Chaucer wrote, in The Canterbury Tales, of a cook who "koude rooste, and sethe, and broille, and frye / Máken mortreux, and wel bake a pye".

[3] The etymology of the word is unknown, but may be related to the magpie (also called "pie"), perhaps because both were spotted, or because the bird collects miscellaneous articles, and almost anything can be wrapped in pastry and cooked.

[7][3] The French and Italians specialized in redefining the pastry of the pie, making it flakier and tastier by new methods of adding butter, rolling, and folding the dough.

[10] Ground beef with olives, fried egg, pulled pork, diced steak, even cheese and salami are used in countries such as Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Puerto Rico and Peru.

Middle Eastern meat pies are called sfiha and contain ground beef, olive oil, plain yogurt, tahini, allspice, onion, tomatoes and pine nuts.

Indian meat pies are called samosa and usually contain peas, spiced potatoes, coriander, lentils, or ground beef or chicken and are often served with chutney.