 Director D. W. Griffith's "The Birth of a Nation" glorified the original Klan.The film was based on the book and play "", as well as the book "The Leopard's Spots", both by Thomas Dixon Jr. Much of the modern Klan's iconography is derived from it, including the standardized white costume and the burning cross.Its imagery was based on Dixon's romanticized concept of old England and Scotland, as portrayed in the novels and poetry of Sir Walter Scott.