One car fact that you were probably pretty sure of before you read this was that the Bentayga was Bentley's first SUV. But buried deep in the British marque's family tree is another, very secretive SUV that was unleashed way back in 1996.
In fact it was so secretive that the world didn't even know of its existence until two years after it was actually produced when UK magazine Autocar ran an article after discovering it was a thing in 1998.
The SUV was called the Bentley Dominator and its very existence is also probably the only reason Bentley is around today.
You see, while Porsche made an SUV (the Cayenne) to save itself from financial ruin back in 2002, Bentley did the same in 1996, except where Porsche has gone on to sell in excess a million Cayennes since 2002, Bentley only ever sold six Dominators.
Oh, and they were all sold to one man.
By now you have probably thinking that the Sultan of Brunei is involved here somewhere, and you would be very correct. All six Bentley Dominators were built for the car-collecting Sultan. Or his slightly dodgy brother, Prince Jefri, depending on which story you believe.
Back in 1996 Bentley (and its parent company Vickers, which also owned Rolls-Royce) was struggling badly for money and the Sultan was the company's single biggest customer. The story goes that the Sultan (or Jefri), not wanting two of his favourite marques to go under, shelled out around NZ$40 million dollars for six bespoke Bentley SUVs.
Yes, that means each one cost around NZ$6.7 million each. Back in 1996.
The Dominator was designed and built in total secrecy and was based on a Range Rover platform. As to what powered it, well, that is a mystery, although it would seem more likely to be Rover's 3.9-litre V8 than Bentley's 6.75-litre V8, as the Dominator is said to have also used Range Rovers 4WD system.
The six Dominators featured bespoke interiors that bore no relation to the donor vehicle, and were finished in a range of colours including grey, red, blue and "royal yellow". The most garish one was said to be a yellow car with a red interior.
Of course Bentley and Rolls-Royce were caught up in the chaotic bidding war between BMW and Volkswagen in 1997 when Vickers announced it was selling the two brands, with VW ending up with Bentley after BMW pulled a swifty and licenced the Rolls-Royce name from Rolls-Royce Holdings, the aircraft engine manufacturer - and totally different company - that owns the rights to the name.
During all this drama the six Dominators sat quietly in the Sultan of Brunei's massive car collection, which was said to feature somewhere between 3000 and 5000 cars and also, sadly, said to have been largely neglected for the last decade or so.
However, one was spotted outside Brunei in 2011 being loaded on a plane - the rumours at the time were that it had been shipped back to Bentley's factory in Crewe because the company was toying with the idea of building an SUV and wanted to see what it had done previously.
Given that Bentley showed the EXP 9 F SUV concept at the 2012 Geneva motor show, and the production Bentayga launched in 2015, this seems to add up.
While all of this lines up nicely, however, it still doesn't explain why the subsequent Rolls-Royce Cullinan looks like a direct descendant of the Dominator though...
