The ampersand is a stylised form of 'et', the Latin word for 'and'. In Roman cursive around the 1st century CE, the letters E and T were sometimes written joined together, and that ligature gradually became a single sign. Scribes kept using it through the Middle Ages, even as its shape lost any obvious trace of an E and a T. The modern italic ampersand descends from Renaissance cursive, and printers after 1455 used both italic and roman forms widely. Because it has Roman roots, it appears in many languages that use the Latin alphabet, and in English it was once taught to children as the 27th letter of the alphabet.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.