Every year, on December 31, merrily inebriated people gather to sing the same song, Auld Lang Syne. The fact that few actually know all of the words, let alone their meaning, has rarely stopped anyone from joining in.

However, now is your chance to be well-informed and in tune with these facts about the song:

1. Robert Burns didn't invent Auld Lang Syne as we know it

The Scottish bard wrote many wonderful pieces of original verse, but this was not among them. Instead, he was the first person to write down a much older Scottish folk song. In 1788 he sent a copy of the song to his friend, Mrs Agnes Dunlop, exclaiming: "There is more of the fire of native genius in it than in half a dozen of modern English Bacchanalians!" Five years later he sent it to James Johnson, who was compiling a book of old Scottish songs, The Scottish Musical Museum, with an explanation: "The following song, an old song, of the olden times, and which has never been in print, nor even in manuscript until I took it down from an old man."

By the time Johnson published it, most likely attributing the verse to the globally known tune, Burns had been dead for a few months.