gigantes y cabezudos
I arrived a little late to the second Encierro, and the barricades were already up by that time.
It turned out not to be a huge problem, tho: I just pushed my way through the already assembled
crowd and crawled through the space between the barriers, taking my place with still half an hour
to spare before the bulls were released at 8 a.m. I think the second time doing anything is the
most difficult for this reason - one already knows what to expect, and doesn't have the vague
naïveté of the first time, when you don't fully process that these bulls are enormous beasts that
could ruin you just by the crush of their weight, much less the sharpness of their horns. You
feel vaguely more prepared, but that's mostly just the blind, forced comfort of being able to say,
"Ok, I've done this before, that must slightly increase the likeliness of my survival." The truth
is, you grow increasingly anxious, and there's a certain sense of impending doom. The remarkable
thing is when this dissipates at 5 minutes to 8 a.m., in part because you already know that you
couldn't live with yourself if your turned away from this (and somehow take enormous comfort in
the reckless boldness of such an interior statement), in part because you're increasingly charged
by the increasingly imminent prospect of being charged, and in part by the sensation of incredible
camaraderie with the anonymous mass of runners (mostly roaring twenty-somethings from countless
nations) in the exact same situation as you. Whatever sense of doom dissipates, and you're just...
ready. Ready for your heart to soar, ready for the consequences, ready for the glory of just doing
the thing in part because you want to, and in part because being the person you are (or would like
to be) necessarily requires it - and you're fine with one thing being the price of the other.
It went fine, at any rate. Here's video:
Click to view
GIGANTES Y CABEZUDOS.
The Gigantes (Giants) of Pamplona, great figures of wood and plaster, have been a staple of the festival for 148 years.
The actual figures date back to 1860. Aged as they may be, they are themselves the modern manifestations of figures that were apparently paraded during the festival atleast as early as the XVIth century (tho some put them as far back as 1276); the originals were used as late as the last quarter of the XVIIIth century, but were apparently banned during an ambitious, Madrid-originating campaign by one of King Carlos III's ministers to do away with "coarse popular customs" and bring in the refined diversions of the Enlightenment. Tho the Royal Decree was revoked after only a few years, in typical Spanish fashion the Giants were unfortunately misplaced during that time and subsequently never seen again (it is known that, for a time, they were stored in a rear cloister of Pamplona's Cathedral; while some argue that they were moved from there into the Basque country [and from there subsequently never seen again], some scholars seriously theorize that the figures may have been absentmindedly walled in during Ventura Rodriguez's landmark neoclassical renovation of the gothic building, and that the figures they still survive between the walls, waiting to be recovered - this, however, is unlikely, as 200 years without maintenance has probably made short work of the wood-and-plaster structures). At any rate, what with the Royal Decree revoked, original figures vanished, the Spanish War of Independence victoriously concluded and the First Carlist War settled, the city fathers of Pamplona graciously decided to reintroduce the figures and, in 1860, commissioned new Giants, Kings symbolically representing the continents and races known and accepted by the Navarrese at that point. We have, therefore, THE KINGS OF EUROPE...
(Who are decidedly Spanish - the King wears the Chain of the Orden del Toisón de Oro - The Order of
the Golden Fleece - sovereignty over which is always exclusively in the hands of the Spanish monarch...)
(...While the Queen carries a fan and wears a typical Spanish mantilla - style actively encouraged by Queen
Isabel II, who reigned at the time; significantly, it is white, which may reference the Privilège du blanc,
extended solely to the female Catholic Monarchs - the Queens of Spain & Belgium, and the Grand-Duchess of Luxembourg.)
...THE KINGS OF ASIA...
(Which are decidedly "Arabian" - the King wears a turban with a crescent ornament and carries a scimitar...)
(The Queen, meanwhile, is pretty sedate; she wears a turban and carries a scepter.)
...THE KINGS OF AFRICA...
(Which are entirely Moorish - the King wears a keffiyeh, carries a scimitar and has the appearance of a berber...)
(...The noble Queen is likewise covered in a flowing veil.)
...THE KINGS OF AMERICA...
(Which are, shockingly, black as night. There's no full explanation for this, save to say that, obviously,
communication was far more limited back then, and no one in Pamplona had ever met an American Indian. Thus,
the artist responsible for the giants likely had to rely on accounts for descriptions of the people from
distant lands, and apparently said reports characterized indigenous natives as being black as night...or something? At any rate, fun anecdote: the Giants were sent to
represent Spain at the 1964 New York World's Fair, and were even featured in their own parade down 5th Avenue
- all of them except for the Kings of America. You'd think it was for politically correct reasons, and you'd
be right - but they were kind of the wrong ones. It wasn't that they were afraid someone might be offended by
the wide-nosed, black figures, but rather that they thought Americans were way too racist to risk sending the
figures over and have them be damaged. So it was that only 6 of the 8 traveled to New York that year.)
(The Queen.)
There are no KINGS OF AUSTRALIA or OCEANIA - neither was explored enough to be considered a continent by the Spanish just yet (indeed, Australia continues to not be recognized as such, and is instead included within the "greater continent" of Oceania to this day). Therefore, the Giants recognize the distinctly provincial Spanish, XIXth-century view of the world: four continents (Europe, Asia, Africa, America) and - I'm not kidding- four races (white, yellow, moor and black).
The Giants are tended to by a select company of men that passes the privilege of carrying them from
generation to generation of the same families. The fellows train during the year to be able to duck
inside and lift the giants, learning steps to the music to allow them to all seamlessly process down
the streets while dancing in pretty perfect unison to the music played by the gaiteros and txistularis.
This is particularly impressive when one considers that each one of the Giants averages 12 feet in height
and weighs more than 150 pounds; imagine carrying that on your shoulders and twirling about on cobblestone.
Seriously, check out that twirling.
At any rate, every morning during San Fermin, a couple of hours after the Encierro, the Giants take a walk
through streets of the city center, accompanied by their 'Comparsa', or ceremonial cortege: a great marching
troupe of gaiteros (basque oboe players, whose instruments make one of the most amazing, high-pitched sounds
in the world) and txistularis (txistu [an amazing three-holed pipe] players)...
...accompanied by the elite Zaldikos, or horse-mounted guards...
...and the famous Cabezudos, which can only be described as disguised fellows wearing oversized heads.
The Zaldikos and Cabezudos are as old as the Giants; the Cabezudos are supposed to be stinging
satirical figures representing some of the city fathers from around the time the figures were
comissioned, but the exact details as to which Cabezudo represents which person has long been
lost, and the figures are referred to by names that have long-since stuck in their place.
There are two different types of Cabezudos: the standard, benevolent figures which are led by...
El Alcalde (The Mayor)
El Concejal (The Council-Member)
La Abuela (The Grandmother)
and El Japonés (The Jap), which presumably was incorporated as
some sort of reference to Pamplona's sister city of Yamaguchi, Japan.
The other sort of Cabezudo is the Kiliki, cabezudos that charge the crowd and beat small children with
foam maces - explanation for which I am entirely at a loss to provide, although I'll say, to the credit
of the seemingly bizarre practice, that my daily encounters with the kilikis were my favourite part of
San Fermín as a child. These are extremely well-known, and dress in a curious late XVIIIth century garb.
Coletas (Ponytail)
Verrugas (Moles)
Barbas (Beardy)
Caravinagre (Vinegar-Face), the most famous of them, who also bears an uncanny resemblance (atleast
in my mind) to second-year professor Rafael Calduch-Cervera. Anyway, yeah, they beat children.
And, indeed, the children love it; the Comparsa de Gigantes is one of the most popular events of the
festival, tho also one of it's most-overlooked by the usual tourists, given the hour during which it
is held (10ish in the morning) little-affords itself to the party-all-night-and-run-with-the-bulls-in
-the-morning crowd, which is usually dispatched to bed (in hostel or hospital) by that time of morning.
