The defining trait of the Spanish national psyche is undoubtedly pride - coupled with ambition. Spain once enjoyed a golden age of riches and power, with colonies in South America and with imperial sway in Europe from the Netherlands in the north to Naples in the south.

But little more than a century later, naval, military and monarchic intrigues had laid waste to Spanish supremacy. The Spanish empire was no more, and the Spanish confined their ambitions to within the Iberian Peninsula.