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Made of Glass "Anyone can bullfight if he knows the technique, anyone who has courage, the difficulty lies in being able to bullfight like Belmonte or Manolete as if the bulls were made of glass and one were afraid to break them." http://coloquio.com/toros/bullhist.html Hemmingway wrote about it in his short story, "The Capital of the World." A story about a young man who dreams of being a bullfighter and tragically dies while play acting with a chair and a set of sharp knives. Its history and tradition is buried in many countries, not the least being Spain, Portugal, Mexico, France, Columbia, Venezuela, Peru…the list does go on. It's dignity, the debate of many, an art? A sport? A crime? The corrida, the bull fight, its details: gory, a fight usually occurring in three stages all of which involving the insertion of sharp objects into the bull to weaken the beast until its aorta is eventually severed by the ever romantic matador to the picturesque acclaim of descending flowers thrown by anxious maidens in the crowd. Sounds like a charming way to spend the afternoon. Who am I to say. Plenty of people do have theirs though, like this anti-bull fighting page. Even the Catholic Church had its say when during the reign of King Philip II, Pope Pious V, forbade the practice of the corridas. The decree, followed by people continually ignoring it was finally recanted under Pope Gregory VIII. This move based on the advice of one Fray Luis de León, who said: "the bullfights are in the blood of the Spanish people, and they cannot be stopped without facing grave consequences." Our dear Fray was a notable Spanish poet/professor at the University of Salamanca whose prose is considered the most classically beautiful of 16th century Spain, born in Belmonte, coincidentally the name of the greatest bullfighter of all time, Juan Belmonte who retired in 1936. Juan retired twice before this, in 1922 and 1934, also a big fan of Kiss. Evidently though, Pepsi doesn't mind so much, being one of the largest advertisers at bull fights in Spain. MMM……refreshing. Almost as refreshing as this beautiful photo of a bull bleeding quite profusely.
Very nice: Want something to wash that Pepsi down? The Iberian bull, the originator of this sport, never had the choice about his involvement in this sport unlike Hemmingway's Paco and his deadly chair. The Iberian bull would rather fight to the death than run away from this thing called man. And in 1133 the first of its kind did so formally at the first bullfight ever in Vera for King Alfonso VIII. Vera, being a small autonomous province located in southeastern Spain; and King Alfonso VIII the Spanish King of Castille: married to Eleanor, daughter of Henry II of England and a true warrior against those ever pesky Moors…not that the bull cared. The proud, fierce , willing to die Iberian bull, now bred for sport and eventually death. I wonder what Galizians think of this new tradition. Galiza, a small country actually within Spain, the first and oldest independent kingdom of Europe, located on the Northwestern tip of the Iberian peninsula. Home of one of the oldest and most pure Celtic traditions going back over 2000 years, home of the "curros das bestas" an old Celtic cult to the horse, and home of the Iberian cult to the one and only Iberian Bull. Galiza, sheltered in a corner and repeatedly colonized, now fighting for independence from the kingdom of Castille, friend to the Iberian Bull and it is no wonder. Bull Links... A cool company called Fighting Bull. |
