Also on this day

Lincoln’s Inn in London admits its first female bar student

The Ginza line, the first Asian underground railway, opens in Tokyo Yet his star continued to rise and by 1915 the tsarina, her husband away, was running the country with Rasputin as her adviser.

Revolution was in the air and the monarchy was under threat. Rasputin’s influence was seen as yet another black mark against them. Desperate to distance them from further scandal, a group of aristocratic conservatives resolved to take matters into their own hands.

On December 29 he was lured to a house and served poison wine and cakes. Amazingly, he showed little ill effect. He was then shot but fled. He was shot a second time, but still did not die. The plotters tied him up and threw him through the ice of St Petersburg’s River Neva where he drowned on December 30.

From the tsar’s point of view, it was too little too late. A few weeks later came the Russian Revolution which would claim the lives of him and his family. This would evolve into the Soviet Union – formed also on this day, in 1922 – an empire which lasted until its collapse in 1991.

Rasputin and his purported mystical powers have enthralled historians but whatever the truth, he helped shape the modern world.

Last week I asked which Scottish poet was born on December 23, 1955. The answer is Carol Ann Duffy. This week’s question: Which English poet and author was born in India on this day in 1865?

Watch Shaun and his colleagues on The Chase on ITV at 5pm every day of the week.