Subject

The trademarked name of a thick, salty meat extract developed in the 1870s by John Lawson Johnson. It is made in Burton upon Trent and is now owned and distributed by Unilever UK. The first part of the product's name comes from the Latin 'bos' meaning ox or cow, and 'vril' from Edward Bulwer-Lytton's novel 'The Coming Race', the plot of which revolves around a superior race of people, the Vril-ya, who derive their powers from an electromagnetic substance named Vril.