Sean Conery, the knight with a Scottish heart

Sean Conery, the knight with a Scottish heart

Sean Connery, the gravelly voiced Scottish actor, who shot to stardom as British secret agent 007 in the James Bond films, turned 70 this August.

Tall, handsome and possessing a famously gruff personality, Connery has often been described as Scotland's favourite Scott and the world's sexiest man.

He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in July, two years after he was reportedly denied a knighthood because of his Scottish nationalism.

Connery is a high-profile supporter of the Scottish National Party, now the official opposition in the home-rule Scottish parliament, and a vocal campaigner for an independent Scotland.

But for millions of film fans, Connery will always be remembered as James Bond, the character he immortalised in the first Bond film Dr No in 1962.Connery, who grew up in the slums of Edinburgh, and once worked as a coffin polisher, played the character created by novelist Ian Fleming in seven Bond films.

They included From Russia With Love, Goldfinger (bothmade in 1964), Thunderball (1965) and You Only Live Twice (1967).

The lavishly-produced movies packed with hi-tech gadgetry and spectacular effects broke box-office records and grossed hundreds of millions of dollars in more than 50 countries.

The success made Connery Britain's most popular film actor for four consecutive years in the mid-60s and he was the number one box-office attraction in American cinemas in 1966.

But Connery was a very different type from the suave, sophisticated Bond with his impeccable social background and connoisseur's taste in wine and women.

Born Thomas Connery on August 25, 1930, he was brought up in near-poverty, never attempted to disguise his raw Scottish accent and preferred beer to Bond's vodka martini cocktails that are `shaken not stirred'.

At the age of 17, two years after the end of world war two, Connery was drafted into the Royal navy and served three years as an ordinary seaman. He hated it.

A chance meeting with a friend resulted in him joining the chorus of the American stage musical South Pacific after 48 hours of dancing and singing lessons.

"I grew up with no notion of a career, much less acting," he once said. "I certainly never have plotted it out. It just happened."

Connery married Frenchwoman Micheline Roquebrune, whom he met playing golf, in 1975. They have homes in the Spanish resort of Marbella and in the Bahamas.