Man of many talents

❚ Prince Philip is worshipped as a god by the people of Tanna, one of the islands in Vanuatu.

❚ His affectionate nickname for the Queen is ‘‘Cabbage’’.

❚ He was the first member of the royal family to be interviewed on television, by Richard Dimbleby in 1961.

❚ The duke was the first layman to pay homage to the Queen, kneeling at her feet at the 1953 coronation.

❚ He made two around-the-world voyages aboard the royal yacht Britannia.

❚ He was chancellor of the universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh, Salford and Wales.

❚ In 1963, he founded a bagpiping competition for the Pakistan army. ❚ The duke is a twitcher and became interested in birdwatching while on Britannia in the 1950s.

❚ He once received two pygmy hippopotami as a gift from President Tubman of Liberia after his state visit to Britain in 1961.

❚ Like the Queen, he is a greatgreat-grandchild of Queen Victoria. He is a direct descendant of Princess Alice, the third child of Queen Victoria, while the Queen is a direct descendant of Victoria’s eldest son, King Edward VII.

❚ He gained his RAF wings in 1953, his helicopter wings in 1956, and his private pilot’s licence in 1959. He notched up 5986 hours in 59 types of aircraft.

❚ He is a freeman of Acapulco, Belfast, Bridgetown, Cardiff, Dar-esSalaam, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Guadalajara, London, Los Angeles, Melbourne and Nairobi.

❚ In 1953, the duke had an early version of a mobile telephone, made by Pye Telecommunications of Cambridge, fitted to his car.

- The Times