Памплонаның Сан-Фермин фестивалі

Annual festival in Pamplona, Spain

The festival of San Fermín is a week long, historically rooted celebration held annually in the city of Pamplona, Navarre, Spain. The celebrations start at noon on 6 July and continue until midnight on 14 July. A firework (Chupinazo)
starts off the celebrations and the popular song Pobre de mí is sung at the end. The most famous event is the running of the bulls, which begins at 8 a. m. each day on 7–14 July, but the festival involves many other traditional and folkloric events. It is known locally as Sanfermines in Spanish and Sanferminak in Basque, and is held in honour of Saint Fermin, the co patron of Navarre. Its events were central to the plot of The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway, which brought it to the general attention of the English speaking world. It has become probably the most internationally renowned festival in Spain with over a million people coming to participate.

Fermín is said to have been the son of a Roman of senatorial rank in Pamplona in the 3rd century, who was converted to Christianity by Saint Honestus, a disciple of Saint Saturninus. According to tradition, he was baptised by Saturninus (in Navarre also known as Saint Cernin) at the spot now known as the "Small Well of Saint Cernin" Fermín was ordained a priest in Toulouse, and returned to Pamplona as its first bishop. On a later preaching voyage, Fermín was dragged to death; and is now considered a martyr in the Catholic Church. Commercial secular fairs were held at the beginning of the summer. As cattle merchants came into town with their animals, eventually bullfighting came to be organised as a part of the tradition. He was fascinated when he first visited in 1923, and returned many times until 1959. The COVID 19 pandemic caused the festival to be cancelled in 2020 and 2021.

The opening of the festival is marked by setting off the firework chupinazo (or txupinazo in Basque language). The rocket is launched at 12:00 noon on July 6 from a city hall balcony with thousands of people celebrating the act in the city hall square and other locations in Pamplona. The chupinazo has officially marked the beginning of the fiesta since 1941. The person who sets it off is decided by the city mayor. Nevertheless, since 1979 tradition has been that each year after city elections the chupinazo is set off by a person from the different city council political groups beginning with the mayor and then political groups ordered by number of representatives. There have been exceptions to this tradition with some non politicians being in charge of the act when they had performed significant achievements during the year. Examples of these exceptions were a player of the local football team, or the president of the "giants and big heads" group in its 150 years anniversary. Following the rocket firing, a pipe band playing percussion and txistus play amongst the crowds, and then marches off the main square.

The Riau Riau was a mass activity held on July 6. The members of the city council parade from the City Hall to a nearby chapel dedicated to Saint Fermín with participants dancing to the Astrain Waltz along the way.

The key day of the festival is July 7, when thousands of people accompany the 15th century statue of Saint Fermin through the old part of Pamplona. The statue is accompanied by dancers and street entertainers, and different political and religious authorities including the city mayor and the Bishop of Pamplona, who leads High Mass before the event. During procession a Jota (an ancient traditional dance) is performed for the saint, a rose is offered in the Saint Fermin well, and the "gigantes" (enormous wood framed and papier mâché puppet figures managed from inside) dance and twirl while the cathedral bell named María (Mary) peals. Mass is held in the city cathedral, as well as in city parishes in honor of the patron.

"El Struendo" ("The Roar") is a single day event with more than 50 years of tradition. It has been purposely left outside the official program and each year is celebrated on a different day, usually on a weekday so as to keep the crowds manageable. People gather at 23:59 at the City Hall and make as much noise as possible for several hours with drums, cymbals, bowls, whistles, pans, or other objects.

After nine days of partying, the people of Pamplona meet in the City Hall Plaza at midnight on July 14, singing the traditional mournful notes of the Pobre de Mí ('Poor Me'), in a candlelit ending. The city mayor closes the festival with participants lighting a candle and removing their red handkerchief as the song is played by the local band, followed by a fireworks display at the city hall. This closing ceremony tradition, which marks the official close of the festivities, started out in the 1920s. Runners gather earlier at the beginning of the itinerary to ask for the protection of the Saint by singing a chant three times before a small statue of San Fermín which has been placed in a raised niche in a wall, in both Spanish and Basque:

“A San Fermín pedimos, por ser nuestro patrón, nos guíe en el encierro, dándonos su bendición. Entzun, arren, San Fermin zu zaitugu patroi, zuzendu gure oinak entzierro hontan otoi.” (Both of which means “To San Fermin we ask to be our patron saint and to guide us in the running of the bulls, giving to us his blessing”)

Viva San Fermin and Gora San Fermin are shouted following the chant. While the chant since 1962 has been sung in Spanish, beginning 2009 a Basque translation is sung following. A second cracker signals that the last bull has left the corral. There are six fighting bulls accompanied by six oxen (often white and brown coloured) that guide them to the "plaza" and followed by three more not fighting oxen. There are also some shepherds guiding the bulls, wearing green T shirts and holding long poles. Once all of the bulls have entered the arena, a third rocket is released while a fourth firecracker indicates that the bulls are in their bullpens and the run has concluded. After the end of the run young cows with wrapped horns are released in the bullring and toss the participants, to the amusement of the crowd. The circuit has only changed slightly since 1852 as the former bullring was located close to the present one. Before that date the bullrunning ended in the "castle plaza", still not far from the present bullring. people have been killed during the event – most recently on July 10, 2009—and every year between 200 and 300 people are injured during the run although most injuries are contusions due to falls and are not serious. Televisión Española (TVE) broadcast daily the event live nationwide and internationally, and clips of the run itself –and the slow motion highlights from cameras placed on the route of the run– are uploaded minutes after the run online.

Every day, during the morning, there is a parade of gigantes y cabezudos (English: "giants and big heads", respectively), with the giant figures being more than 150 years old. The eight giant figures were built by Tadeo Amorena, a painter from Pamplona, in 1860, and represent four pairs of kings and queens of four different races and places (Europe, Asia, America and Africa). Their height is around each, and they are carried by a dancer inside a wooden structure. During the parade, giants dance following the rhythm of traditional music. The remaining 17 figures include 6 kilikis, 5 big heads, and 6 zaldikos, built at different times between 1860 and 1941. Kilikis and big heads are caricaturesque, but human like figures that are carried as helmets. Big heads masks are up to tall, and kilikis slightly smaller. While big heads simply precede the giants and wave their hands at spectators, kilikis run after children, hitting them with a foam truncheon. Zaldikos, figures representing horses with their riders, also run after children with a truncheon.

There are exhibitions and competitions of Basque rural sports every morning in the "Plaza de los Fueros", a square close to the city citadel, although they were formerly held in the bullring. Sports include stone lifting, wood cutting, or hay bale lifting. In addition the 5th bullfight with younger bulls and not fully trained bullfighters is performed while the 6th features bullfighters on horses (in Spanish "rejoneo"). While the bullring of the city is the fourth largest in size in the world, it is full every afternoon and tickets are hard to find. Thousands of people watch them seated on the grass around the citadel.