How many days and weeks until September 20th?

On September 20th 1519 Ferdinand Magellan sailed from Sanlúcar de Barrameda with five ships and about 270 men, looking for a western route to the Spice Islands. He found the strait that carries his name, crossed a Pacific so much wider than anyone had allowed for that the crews ate leather from the rigging, and was killed in the Philippines in 1521. One ship completed the circuit three years later, carrying enough cloves in her hold to cover the cost of the whole expedition.

The Battle of the Alma, on September 20th 1854, was the first major engagement of the Crimean War, and British and French troops carried the heights above the river at considerable cost. What made it different from every British battle before it was that W. H. Russell of The Times was there, and his despatches reached London in days rather than months.

Billie Jean King beat Bobby Riggs in the Houston Astrodome on the evening of September 20th 1973, American time, before 30,000 people and a television audience of some ninety million. The first Cannes Film Festival had opened on September 20th 1946, seven years late; the 1939 edition was abandoned when war broke out.

James Dewar invented the vacuum flask and never patented it, which is why the thermos is a German trademark. He was born in Fife on September 20th 1842, and Sophia Loren, the Italian actress who became one of world cinema’s most celebrated leading ladies, in Rome in 1934.

Born on September 20th: star sign, birthstone and birth flower

Sophia Loren and James Dewar — both named above — share this star sign with everyone else born in the same window.

None of this is settled fact in the way the history above is — zodiac dates, birthstones and birth flowers are conventions rather than laws, and different sources hedge them slightly differently. The birthstone is the most standardised of the three (set by the trade in 1912 and revised since); the birth flower is the least, resting on Victorian tradition rather than any governing body.

Gift ideas for a September 20th birthday

A small, themed starting point rather than a shopping list — sapphire for the stone, Virgo for the sign, and the sky itself on the day.

September birthstone necklace

A simple pendant in the actual September birthstone colour, from a long-running UK jewellery brand.

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Virgo constellation necklace

Stainless steel, sign selectable at checkout — choose Virgo for a September 20th birthday.

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Personalised birth flower & birthstone disc

Engraved with a name, the September birthstone and the aster — both in one pendant, in a gift box.

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Personalised star map print

The actual night sky over a chosen place on September 20th, whichever year — a print rather than jewellery.

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