On Sat, 25 Aug 2007 13:07:14 -0700, "Max Hauser"
> wrote:

>Question arose about ambiguous North American spelling of an old condiment.
>
>In fact it's a phonetic word, evidently imported into English and without
>traditional consistent spelling (data below), a situation not uncommon.
>(Another example that arose on newsgroups is "recipe" and "receipt,"
>pronounced differently today in NA English although "receipt" appears
>interchangeably with "recipe" in older cookbooks. A scholar of 18th-century
>English advises that they were the same word originally, just different
>spellings.) Lacking consistent spelling, people can spell ketchup as they
>please, and they do.
>
>As shown below, popular US cookbooks for 200 years normally spelled it
>catsup. I seem to remember such spelling as common on tomato-catsup bottles
>through about the 1960s, ketchup gradually displacing it (more phonetic, or
>a British Invasion? Compare Mrs Beeton below). At the same time, catsups as
>a wide class of savory condiments, from various vegetables, fruits, or
>seafoods, and normally unsweetened, became eclipsed by commercial tomato
>catsup, which also got sweeter. The Hesses in _The Taste of America_
>(1977), who by the way spell it ketchup, note that it was widely homemade,
>in various flavors, until recent times. They cite OED for the Amoy Chinese
>word kétsiap, and say the Malay word kechap may also come from that source.
>The Hesses wryly add that a modern US firm developed a bottled ketchup with
>natural tomato flavor but it didn't sell, until the product was "slightly
>scorched and a metallic component added to give it the taste of 'real'
>ketchup." (A comment fairly representative of their book.)
>
>What I found in popular, mostly US, published cookbooks:
>
>
>Mary Randolph,* 1824 (edition of 1860): "Catsup"
>
>Eliza Leslie, 1837 (edition 1851): "Catchup" (including "Tomata"
>tchup.) -- A chapter with eight recipes. Three include wine, one beer.
>
>Mrs Beeton (British, edition 1861): "Ketchup"
>
>Fannie Farmer, 1927: "Catsup"
>
>Morrison Wood (_With A Jug of Wine_), 1949: "Catsup"
>
>Joy of Cooking, 1964: "Catsup"
>
>Fannie Farmer, 1965: "Catsup" (five recipes)
>
>
>Respectfully submitted -- Max

There is an Indonesian thick, sweet soy-based sauce called "Ketjap
Manis", no doubt another variation on this theme :-)

CJ