Though the date of the Buddha’s death is uncertain, we know that his body was cremated and his ashes placed in eight urns buried in earth mounds. Two centuries later the Maurya Emperor of India, Ashoka (see here), would excavate these urns and subdivide them to create 84,000 memorial shrines to Buddha.

A rousing British song, strongly associated with the Royal Navy, ‘Rule, Britannia!’ is based on a poem of the same name written in 1740 by Scottish poet and playwright James Thomson (1700–48), and set to music by leading theatre composer Thomas Arne (1710–78)

The five most common countries of birth in the UK calendar years 2007–11 were (in order): India, Poland, Pakistan, Republic of Ireland and Germany. The five most common nationalities are Polish, Irish, Indian, Pakistani and American