A second home in the country is a luxury the French can no longer afford - cue an invasion of British bargain hunters?

It says much about the life of Xabier Lopez Peña, aka Thierry, that virtually the first time he came into full-scale public view, in May 2008, was also almost the last. Over the previous three decades, Thierry was strongly suspected of becoming a key figure in the Basque terrorist group Eta, and it was only when he was arrested along with three other alleged Eta members in a French police operation that the clandestine existence he had led since the early 1980s came to a definitive conclusion.

Gloucester 31 Biarritz 41

Father ran on to pitch in Paris to celebrate his son's try

Thirty years ago, with fewer than two-dozen members of their species left, they faced extinction.

So according to the Guild of One-Name Studies, an organisation devoted to the study of family names, "traditional English surnames" such as Mackmain, Bythewood, Foothead and Pauncefoot, are dying out. This news, delivered in a book by Mrs Debbie Kennett of that Guild, has been reported in a Sunday newspaper. "They are names that have been passed down through generations of Britons," was how the article in The Sunday Telegraph glossed this. What on earth, I wonder, could they possibly be driving at?

Seventeen years after he fled from Spain, a Basque terror suspect has been arrested in Liverpool, where he was  living under a false identity.

Scarlets made a miserable start to their Heineken Cup campaign, losing 49-16 at Clermont Auvergne after having Morgan Stoddart sent off shortly before half-time.

Harlequins 40 Biarritz 13: Quins tear French side apart in second half but lose Evans to injury

Far from being a failed state, this is a country that can do great things

Toulon 18 Biarritz 21

Foster's wholly unique voice has the eerie, tremulous quality of a bowed saw. By contrast, the band attack their acoustic instruments with admirable ferocity.

The bombing of Guernica 75 years ago inspired one of Picasso's best-known works. Now, visitors to this iconic part of Spain's Basque Country will discover a town devoted to peace

Athletic Club de Bilbao are famed for their Basque heritage; only players from the region can represent the team, but the visit of Manchester United tonight will be a celebration of Anglophilia for a club founded by English quarrymen and local students who had studied in England.