The vegetable called eggplant in North America is known as aubergine in most other English-speaking countries.
Eggplant is the common North American name for Solanum melongena, a plant in the nightshade family. The same fruit is called aubergine in British, Irish, and New Zealand English, while brinjal is widely used in parts of South Asia and elsewhere. Although cooks treat it as a vegetable, botanically it is a berry because it develops from a flower and contains seeds.
The name “eggplant” originally referred to white, egg-shaped varieties that were popular in the 18th century. Today, many familiar cultivars are elongated and dark purple, but fruits can also be white, green, yellow, striped, or nearly black. Their absorbent flesh readily takes on oil, spices, and other cooking flavors.
Eggplant is related to tomatoes, potatoes, and chili peppers, but the crop originated in Eurasia rather than the Americas. It was cultivated in South and East Asia before reaching the Mediterranean through the medieval Islamic world. The other options—bell pepper, cucumber, and zucchini—are different plants and do not share the eggplant/aubergine naming distinction.