GETTY Agatha Christie, creator of Hercule Poirot, was born on September 15, 1890

1. The word “detective” for a crime-solver, was first used in 1843. 2. The first known use of the phrase “detective story” was in 1883 in the title of a crime story by the American author Anna Katharine Green. 3. The first literary detective was probably C Auguste Dupin in Edgar Allan Poe’s 1841 short story Murders In The Rue Morgue.

4. Poe may have been inspired by the memoirs of the Sûreté detective agency’s Eugène Vidocq. 5. Wilkie Collins’ The Woman In White (1859) was the first full-length detective novel. 6. One of the great mysteries of crime novels is the identity of the author of The Notting Hill Mystery (1862-63) which is still not known for sure.

Best TV detectives Mon, September 5, 2016 From Miss Marple to Luther, here are the best detectives on TV. Play slideshow 1 of 18