In 1905, Sir Henry Wood composed a musical tribute to Nelson's Trafalgar victory, weaving together traditional sea songs into a patriotic tapestry meant for a single commemorative moment. More than a century on, that moment has dissolved into something far larger — the Fantasia on British Sea-Songs now anchors the Last Night of the Proms each year, no longer a memorial to a battle but a vessel carrying the fluid, contested idea of Britishness itself. It is a reminder that the works we create for specific occasions sometimes escape their origins entirely, becoming mirrors in which later generat