The word ketchup first appeared in English in 1682, and in Britain early ketchups were mushroom-based, not tomato. Tomato versions appeared in American cookbooks, including The Virginia Housewife in 1824, and Jonas Yerkes is credited with first bottling it commercially. Early tomato ketchups were thin and used unripe tomatoes, and often contained anchovies. Modern ketchup emerged in the early 1900s after the chemist Harvey Wiley challenged sodium benzoate, a preservative banned in the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act. Companies including Henry J. Heinz sought alternatives, and in 1909 Katherine Bitting showed that more sugar and vinegar would prevent spoilage. That sweet, sour, thick formula is what most people now call ketchup.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.