born July 23, 1886, La Coruña, Spain
died Dec. 14, 1978, Locarno, Switz.
Spanish writer, diplomat, and historian.
Abandoning an engineering career for journalism, he joined the League of Nations Secretariat in 1921 as a press member, served as ambassador to the U.S. and France, and was Spain's permanent delegate to the League (1931–36). When the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, he moved to England, returning only after Francisco Franco 's death. He wrote prolifically in English, German, French, and Spanish, his works including Englishmen, Frenchmen, Spaniards (1928), Spain (1942), The Rise and Fall of the Spanish American Empire (1945), and novels based on Latin American history.