For more than three decades, the London legal market has been dominated by five law firms: Linklaters, Allen & Overy, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Slaughter and May, and Clifford Chance. They hired the best people, they did the most prestigious work and they paid staff the most money.

In the 1990s, the legal press decided to give the firms a nickname: ‘the Magic Circle’. That name stuck — bestowing brand cachet on the lucky five and inciting envy in the chasing pack of other firms.