Why is "essentially" spelt with a T when "essence" is not? I'm confident there are many other examples of this phenomenon as well. I'm curious as to whether there is a rule behind this, or at least an etymological reason.

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@renfoxy I'm inclined to think you're right, but then again it doesn't really explain anything ultimately. You could just as well have had "ci" pronounced "sh", instead of "ti" with the same pronunciation. And if the original pronunciation did have a T sound, I have no idea why that would be or how "essence" would then be spelt as it is -- though I believe palatalisation from /ti/ --> /tj/ --> /ʃ/ is common in English; presumably words like "nation" changed at some point from being pronounced as spelt to getting the SH sound.

I suspect Latin and French have something to do with it. Perhaps the pronunciation changed in French from "esent" to "esens", and then English borrowed "essence" from French and "essential" more directly from Latin? Some words (like "debt") had their spelling influenced by Latin, so perhaps for some reason this is how the T was borrowed to be used in "essential" ...

@renfoxy Huh. Interesting. If you could elaborate or give any example of words which follow such a pattern more accurately, I'd be grateful if you did.