National stereotypes

GK Chesterton, The defendant: A Spanish nobleman, when commanded by the King to receive a high-placed and notorious traitor, said: ‘I will receive him in all obedience, and burn down my house afterwards.’ Pepys’ Diary: My Lord told me that among his father’s many old sayings that he had writ in a book or his,…

Falangist sardanas

This is hilarious: not only was the sardana not banned by Franco, but it actually formed part of the repertoire of the Spanish Falange‘s women’s display dance team. Apparently SF Women’s Section founder Pilar Primo de Rivera said just before the end of the war: When Catalans can sing the songs of Castile; when in…