Each year on the first Saturday of June, Anxo Varela steps on to a stage in the village of Ribadumia, Galicia, and swears in the new members of a brotherhood dedicated to protecting an illegal grape.
Clad in black vests over white shirts, wine-coloured scarves around their necks and black berets atop their heads, the chosen step forward one by one as Varela intones the solemn question: ‘Do you swear to defend until you collapse – not from drunkenness – the virtues of...
