ABSTRACT
The institutions, traditions, and values brought to the Americas by Hispanic invaders shaped the future of Latin America more decisively than the culture of the vanquished Indians. A turning point in Iberian peninsular history was the marriage, in 1469, of the heirs apparent to the thrones of Aragon and Castile-Ferdinand and Isabella. The heroic figure of Ruy Dias de Vivar, the Cid Campeador, or Warrior Lord, as he was called lry his Moslem soldiers, typifies in Spanish popular tradition the crusading era of Hispanic history. The great mooement of the Reconquista-the Reconquest of Spain from the Moslems-left an enduring stamp on the Spanish character. The Spaniards are of melancholy and choleric disposition, darkskinned, small in stature, and haughty by nature. All Spaniards carry arms, and in the old days they took part not only in foreign wars but in domestic broils, each man siding with one faction or another.
