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Encierro

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Wikipedia

The Running of the Bulls (in Spanish encierro, from the verb encerrar, to shut in, to lock up) is a practice that involves running in front of bulls that have been let loose on a course of a sectioned-off subset of a town's streets. The most famous running of the bulls is that of the nine-day festival of San Fermín in Pamplona, although they are held in towns and villages across Spain and in some cities in southern France, during the summer. Unlike bullfights, which are performed by professionals, anyone may participate in an encierro.

The origin of this custom is the transport of the bulls from the off-site corrals where they had spent the night to the bullring where they would be killed in the evening. Youngsters would jump among them to show off their bravado.

Injuries are common to the participants who may be gored or trampled, and to the bulls, whose hooves grip poorly on the paved or cobbled street surfaces.

The event

Before the running of the bulls, a set of wooden or iron barricades is erected to direct the bulls along the route and to block off sidestreets. There may be a double row of barricades along the route to allow runners to quickly exit in case of danger. The gaps in the barricades are wide enough for a person to slip through, but narrow enough to block a bull.

A group of large oxen are released at the end of the run to pick up any stragglers and a run is considered good if the bulls flow swiftly. Whenever a bull gets separated from the herd, it can be dangerous because it will be disoriented and will then often attack anything, or anyone who moves and attracts its attention.

Pamplona

The Pamplona encierro is the most popular in Spain and is broadcasted live by two national television channels. It is the highest profile event of the San Fermin festival, which is held every year from July 6-14.. The first bull running is on July 7, followed by one on each of the following mornings of the festival, beginning every day at 8am.

Being over over eighteen and entering the itinerary before 7:30. are the main requirements to participate. Other prohibitions are to run under the influence of alcohol, run in the opposite direction of the running or incite the bulls.

The event begins with runners singing three times "A San Fermín pedimos, por ser nuestro patrón, nos guíe en el encierro dándonos su bendición" ("We ask San Fermín, as our Patron, to guide us through the encierro and give us his blessing"), a prayer to a statue of Saint Fermin, patron of the festival and the city, to ask his protection. The singing finishes shouting “Viva San Fermín!, Gora San Fermín!” (Long live San Fermin, in Spanish and Basque). Runners dress in the traditional clothing of the festival which consists of white shirt and trousers with a red waistband and neckerchief. In one hand, they hold the day's newspaper rolled to draw the bulls' attention from them if necessary. A first rocket is set off to alert the runners that the corral gate is open. A second rocket signals that all six bulls and six steers have been released. A third and forth rockets are signals of all the herd entering the bullring and its corral respectively, marking the end of the event. The average duration between the first rocket and the end of the encierro is around four minutes.

The herd is composed by the six bulls to be fought in the afternoon and two groups of oxen. Eight oxen run with the bulls and three more leave the corral two minutes later. The function of the oxen is to guide the herd and are all the days of the festival the same. The average speed of the herd is 24 Km/h.

Deaths since 1910 in the bull run of Pamplona
Year	Name	Age	Origin	Location
1924	Esteban Domeño	22	Navarre. Spain	Telefónica
1927	Santiago Zufía	34	Navarre. Spain	Bullring
1935	Gonzalo Bustinduy	29	Mexico	Bullring
1947	Casimiro Heredia	37	Navarre. Spain	Estafeta
1947	Julián Zabalza	23	Navarre. Spain	Bullring
1961	Vicente Urrizola	32	Navarre. Spain	Santo Domingo
1969	Hilario Pardo	45	Navarre. Spain	Santo Domingo
1974	Juan Ignacio Eraso	18	Navarre. Spain	Telefónica
1975	Gregorio Gorriz	41	Navarre. Spain	Bullring
1977	José Joaquín Esparza	17	Navarre. Spain	Bullring
1980	José Antonio Sánchez	26	Navarre. Spain	Town Hall Square
1980	Vicente Risco	29	Badajoz. Spain	Bullring
1995	Matthew Peter Tassio	22	Illinois. USA	Town Hall Square
2003	Fermín Etxeberría	63	Navarre. Spain	Mercaderes

The length of the run is around 840 meters and goes through 4 streets of the old part of the village (Santo Domingo, Town Hall Square, Mercaderes and Estafeta) and a section called "Telefónica" before entering into the bullring. The fastest part of the route is up Santo Domingo and across the Town Hall Square, but the bulls often became separated at the entrance to Estafeta Street as they slow down. One or more would slip going into the turn at Estafeta, but with the use of the new anti-slip surfacing, most of the bulls negotiate the turn onto Estafeta and are often ahead of the steers. This has resulted in a quicker, but not safer run as the bulls are usually out ahead of the steers as they reach the lane.

Every year between 200 and 300 people are injured during the run although most injuries are contusions due to falls and are not serious. Since 1910, 14 people have been killed in Pamplona, the last person to be killed in the Pamplona's bull run was Fermín Etxeberria Iraneta a 63-year-old veteran runner from Pamplona who died in 2003 from a head injury while the last person to be directly killed by the bull's horns was Matthew Tassio, an American tourist who was gored in 1995.

The encierro of Pamplona has been depicted many times in literature, television or advertising. The cinema pioneer Louis Lumiére filmed the run in 1931. but was world wide known partly due to the descriptions of Ernest Hemingway in The Sun Also Rises and Death in the Afternoon.

Other examples

Although the most famous running of the bulls is that of San Fermín, they are held in towns and villages across Spain and in some cities in southern France during the summer. Examples are the bull run of San Sebastián de los Reyes, near Madrid, at the end of august which is the most popular of Spain after Pamplona, the bull run of Cuéllar, considered as the oldest of Spain since there are documents of its existence dating back to 1215, or the bull run of Navalcarnero held at night.

A variation is the nightly "fire bull" where balls of flammable material are placed on the horns. Nowadays the bull is often replaced by a runner carrying a frame on which fireworks are placed and dodgers, usually children, run to avoid the sparks.

Opposition

Many animal rights activists oppose the event. PETA activists have created the "running of the nudes", a demonstration the day before the beginning of San Fermín in Pamplona. By marching naked, they protest the festival and the following bullfight claiming they torture the bulls for entertainment. .