CHROKNOWLEDGEY

THE following ten events occurred during the past 2,000 years, and all happened on Christmas Day. Events occurring before 1752 have been recorded according to the Julian Calendar, as this is the year it was replaced by the Gregorian Calendar in Great Britain. The earliest event occurred in the year 336 AD and the most recent in 1991. Place the ten events in chronological order. AJOHN

REITH, the first director-general of the BBC, persuades George V to issue the first Christmas broadcast by the monarch in what would become an annual tradition. BTHE

first formal Christian celebration of Christmas on December 25 occurs in Rome. CLATE

in the night, George Washington leads troops across the icy Delaware River as part of a surprise attack on Hessian Forces serving Great Britain. DMIKHAIL

GORBACHEV resigns as leader of the Soviet Union, marking the end of the USSR, and the Soviet hammer and sickle is replaced by the new Russian flag. EWILLIAM

the Conqueror, a Norman duke, is crowned William I of England in Westminster Abbey a month after his march on London. FSOVIET

tanks roll across the border into Afghanistan, initiating a guerrilla war and laying a foundation for radical militant groups including Al Qaeda. GRIVAL

British and German soldiers ascend from their trenches in several places along the Western Front in an unofficial ceasefire, exchanging gifts and playing football in No Man’s Land. HISAAC

NEWTON, who will go on to pioneer calculus and devise universal laws of gravitation, is born in Lincolnshire three months after the death of his father. I CHARLEMAGNE becomes Emperor of the Romans, marking the formation of what is now known as the Holy Roman Empire. JCHARLIE

CHAPLIN, one of the biggest Hollywood stars of the silent film era thanks to his persona The Tramp, dies at his home in Switzerland, aged 88.