The etymological origin of the word ketchup is a of confusion. For almost two centuries speculation has raged the origin of the word and what it signifies. A pseudonymous British author, Lancelot Sturgeon, maintained that the legendary Frenchman Vatel was its real inventor in the late seventeenth century. , Sturgeon cited no for his statement. Vatel did not publish a cookbook, and no others have connected him with ketchup; nor does the term appear in early French cookery books. French food books the British accountable ketchup, which they identify as a 'Condiment of English origin, widely used in both England and the U.S.A.' The writer on food and cookery Elizabeth David suggests in her Spice, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen that the word from caveach, a form of spiced-vinegar pickle in which cooked fish was preserved. She announced that the word in different forms manifested itself throughout European cookery and even turned up in Mexico and Japan.