Worcestershire sauce

[Mr Tuition]

Is it me, or is this one of the hardest english words to pronounce, I often here it called worcester sauce, is that because even english people find it impossible

[David L.]

Ask people to pronounce Cirencester!

[rewboss]

Originally Posted by Mr Tuition

Is it me, or is this one of the hardest english words to pronounce, I often here it called worcester sauce, is that because even english people find it impossible

Hmm. Worcestershire sauce is an ingredient in the drink known as Bloody Mary. You try saying "Worcestershire sauce" after five of those.

Seriously, though, it is a bit of a tongue-twister, and speakers of all languages tend to find phonetic "shortcuts" for difficult combinations of sound. Plus, I suspect a lot of people genuinely believe that the sauce is named after Worcester, the city, not Worcestershire, the county. The Wikipedia entry for Worcestershire sauce states that it is "generically referred to as Worcester sauce".

(Between 1974 and 1998, Worcestershire as an administrative county didn't exist; it was part of the county of Hereford and Worcester. I doubt if that actually had any effect on the pronunciation of "Worcestershire sauce", though.)