useless-catalanfacts

[useless-catalanfacts]

In this video by Daily Catalan (Instagram, TikTok), she shows you how her family makes ratafia, one of the most widespread Catalan liquors, which many families make at home with the ingredients they pick on Midsummer Night (Nit de Sant Joan).

[useless-catalanfacts]

Snippets of the festa major (traditional Catalan festivity that each town or city holds on their patron day) of Valls, Camp de Tarragona, Catalonia.

Credits: The videos were posted by the festivities' account Sant Joan Valls on Instagram. The bands playing in the two last videos are Els Catarres and Figa Flowas.

[useless-catalanfacts]

People from L'Alguer celebrating Sant Joan's eve (holiday on the summer solstice night).

Photos by Gabriele Doppiu and Mauro Madau on Instagram.

[useless-catalanfacts]

En los últimos años muchas revetlles necesitan tener vallas por razones legales, en mi pueblo también las han puesto y mira que aquí somos poca gente comparado con la multitud que se ve en las fotos. No sé el caso concreto de l'Alguer pero todas las que yo he visto es porque es parte del protocolo de seguridad y si no lo haces el Ayuntamiento no te deja encender hogueras. Obviamente es gratis saltar, pero la administración pública considera que tiene que haber espacio vacío alrededor de las hogueras para que no puedan haber incendios ni empujones o avalanchas (cualquier persona que haya estado entre multitudes, ya sea en una fiesta popular o entre el público de un concierto, sabrá que es relativamente fácil que se empuje y hasta que haya un cierto "efecto dominó"; en los casos donde hay fuego por en medio es importante que no se pueda empujar a la gente y hacerla caer en el fuego). Cuando se esperan grandes cantidades de gente, hoy en día casi siempre se ponen vallas y se tiene que entrar por unos puntos en concreto, para tenerlo ordenado. No es lo mejor, pero dadas las circunstancias es comprensible.

Honestamente, creo que es de mal gusto dejar comentarios como este que están claramente juzgando desde la ignorancia dando por supuesto cosas que no sabéis. Podéis plantear como pregunta lo que queráis, pero este comentario está claramente dirigido a dejar mal a personas que no conoces acusándolos de privatizar la playa por participar en una revetlla.

People from L'Alguer celebrating Sant Joan's eve (holiday on the summer solstice night).

Photos by Gabriele Doppiu and Mauro Madau on Instagram.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Bona diada dels Països Catalans!

Sant Joan és una de les poques festes (de fet, l'única que no és una celebració religiosa) que se celebra de forma conjunta arreu dels Països Catalans: des de la Flama del Canigó a la Catalunya Nord, a les fogueres d'Alacant, les festes amb cavalls de Ciutadella i la crema de bujots a Sant Lluís a Menorca, el ball de Sant Joan Pelós a diverses localitats de Mallorca, les baixades de falles al Pirineu i Andorra i totes les revetlles populars celebrades arreu de Catalunya, el País Valencià, la Franja i l'Alguer.

És una festa lligada al foc i a l'aigua, que simbolitza el final de la sega dels camps ("Pel juny, la falç al puny") i la celebració del solstici d'estiu. Des de la dècada del 1980, se celebra també com a Festa Nacional dels Països Catalans, amb el foc i la llengua com a elements centrals que ens agermanen, i com a símbol de resistència del poble català, que no s'ha deixat vèncer pels segles de repressió i persecució dels estats espanyol i francès.

___________

Happy Day of the Catalan Countries!

Sant Joan (Midsummer, June 24th) is one of the few holidays (in fact, the only one that isn't a religious feast) that is celebrated together all around the Catalan Countries: from the Canigó Flame in Northern Catalonia, to the Alacant bonfires, the horse festivities of Ciutadella and the burning of Bujots in Sant Lluís in Menorca, the Sant Joan Pelós dance in various towns of Mallorca, the falles in the Pyrenees and Andorra, and all the eve parties and festivals celebrated all around Catalonia, the Valencian Country, la Franja and L'Alguer.

It's a holiday linked to fire and water, and which symbolizes the ending of the fields' reaping season that used to happen during all of June (we have the saying "In June, the sickle in your fist") and the celebration of the summer solstice. Since the 1980s, it's also celebrated as the National Holiday of the Catalan Countries, with fire and language as the central elements that unites us, and as a symbol of resistance of the Catalan people, who has not given in to the centuries of oppression and persecution from the Spanish and French states.

[useless-catalanfacts]

People from L'Alguer celebrating Sant Joan's eve (holiday on the summer solstice night).

Photos by Gabriele Doppiu and Mauro Madau on Instagram.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Se podría decir lo mismo de cualquier tradición. ¿También considerarías que es tremendamente chungo que todo el mundo haga una comida con la familia y coma el mismo postre y cante las mismas canciones por Navidad?

No sé de dónde eres ni cuál es tu cultura, pero seguro que también tenéis alguna tradición, algún día donde es típico reunirse con la familia o con los amigos para hacer algo en concreto. Si te parece chungo en general que haya cosas típicas, pues es cosa tuya y no digo nada, pero si solo te parecen chungas las tradiciones en comunidad de otras culturas y no las tuyas, repiénsatelo.

People from L'Alguer celebrating Sant Joan's eve (holiday on the summer solstice night).

Photos by Gabriele Doppiu and Mauro Madau on Instagram.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Genuinely thank you for running this blog! It is always such a treat when you show up on my dash and I get to learn about a new festival or tradition! Hope you’re having a great day!!

Thank you so much!! ☺️ I'm happy to know you like it.

[useless-catalanfacts]

People from L'Alguer celebrating Sant Joan's eve (holiday on the summer solstice night).

Photos by Gabriele Doppiu and Mauro Madau on Instagram.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Translation of the image:

In the Pityusic Islands, it is believed that if on the night of Saint John (Midsummer) or New Year’s you pick a very small herb that grows under the old bridge over the river of Santa Eulàlia (a bridge that was built by the Devil) and put it in a black bottle, the Fameliar appears: a hideous dwarf with a terrifying mouth and thin long arms.

The Famerliar has a benevolent character, but also colossal strength and power.

When it gets out of the bottle, it constantly demands work or food.

Fameliar is a lesser demon from the legends of the Pityusic Islands (Eivissa and Formentera). He was kept inside a black bottle until a human needed him to complete a task that would be impossible for us, such as reaping a whole field in a day or building a wall in one night.

The fameliar is very nervous, and when he’s released from the bottle he says “som el fameliar, vull feina o menjar” (“I am the fameliar, I want work or food”), and then the person who released him gives the order, or lets him eat. He loves bread with cheese.

He has a benevolent character, and unlike other similar being of Catalan legends (such as minairons) he doesn’t misbehave when he isn’t given any orders, and always finishes the task. He has a human body but smaller, with a disproportionately big head and small arms and legs, and he’s bald. He’s a good helper, and is supernaturally strong. He’s such a hard worker, that the only way to make him get tired is to order him to fulfill impossible tasks.

To get him inside the bottle again, one must hold a blessed olive tree branch and say a prayer that nobody remembers anymore.

There are known cases of people in Eivissa who were judged by the Inquisition for having fameliars at home, such as Bartomeu Fluixà from Sant Llorenç in the 18th century.

The illustration is by Melicotó, if you speak Catalan check out their blog or follow them on social media (facebook / instagram / twitter) for more illustrations about culture from the Balearic and Pityusic islands and cute products based on popular culture from the islands.

[useless-catalanfacts]

The midsummer flame.

Sant Joan (Midsummer or Saint John’s Night) is one of the main festivity for Catalan people, it’s even considered the unofficial national day of the Catalan Countries.

All around the country, people will be throwing fireworks, lighting bonfires and eating coca de Sant Joan and coca de llardons with their friends. Legends say that this is the most magical night of the year, where you may see small magical beings like fairies and little elves and where there are many superstitions, often related to fire.

Various poems and songs talk about this magical night, the most famous of which is the 1886 epic poem Canigó by Jacint Verdaguer. As the name shows, this poem is centered around the Canigó mountain (in Northern Catalonia), a highly symbolic place for the origin of our nation, both historically and in legends.

In 1955, inspired by this poem, a Northern Catalan man from Arles walked to the top of the mountain, 2,784 meters high, to retrieve a flame. Each year, more people would join him, and this has created a modern tradition. Since 1965, the tradition is fixed as the following: all the people who want (usually about 400 people who come from all around the Catalan Countries) meet and eat together, and then at the night of June 22nd and the early morning of the 23rd they climb the mountain together, light the fire at the mountain top while reading a poem, and the next morning they bring back down the fire in their lanterns. The flame is kept until next year in the Castellet (a medieval fortification in Perpinyà, the capital city of Northern Catalonia), and each of the participants goes back to their city or town with the flame, where the flame they brought from the Canigó is used to light their bonfires on Sant Joan’s night (June 23rd to 24th). Towns who didn’t send anyone to the Canigó will often go and get some Canigó fire from a nearby town who has it. It’s calculated that, on Midsummer’s night, more than 3,000 bonfires are lit with the Canigó’s flame.

Fire is a symbolic element in Catalan culture that is part of different traditional festivities (Sant Joan, festes majors, falles del Pirineu, falles de València, Sant Antoni…). The Canigó flame being used to light bonfires all around the Catalan Countries symbolizes brotherhood and the vitality of Catalan culture and that we don’t forget who we are, no matter how hard they try to erase us (remember that when the tradition was started, Franco’s dictatorship in Spain was still persecuting Catalan culture and language and both France and Spain made teachers beat children who were heard speaking Catalan).

Photos by Jordi Borràs for La Mira.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Recently we talked about Mirmanda, the ancient destroyed city of Catalan mythology. Today we’re talking about another mythical place from our legends: Paradela.

According to the legends, Paradela is a city that resurfaces from the bottom of the sea only once a year, on Sant Joan / Saint John’s Night (23rd of June). When that happens, the city - surrounded by walls, towers and bell towers - can be seen from certain areas of Menorca (Balearic Islands).

It’s no surprise that Sant Joan is the date chosen: as we’ve explained before, Saint John is considered the most magical night of the year in the Catalan traditions, when mythological beings are in closer contact with humans and magic spells have the strongest effect. Many legends that talk about things that only happen once a year are set on this night.

The tradition says that if 7 men named Joan and 7 women named Joana come to see the city together, the curse will expire and Paradela will regain the population and riches that it had in the moment when it sank.

Variations of the name: the same legendary city is called “Paradella” in Palma and “Troia” in Felanitx.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Nit de Sant Joan, Barcelona, c. 1953

Francesc Catalá-Roca

[useless-catalanfacts]

On the days around Midsummer (Sant Joan, June 24th), in Catalonia there's the tradition of making bouquets with St. John's wort, cotton lavender, curry plant, walnut leaf, and stonecrop, and can include thyme, rosemary and other local plants. They are flowers that grow in our landscape and which are in bloom on the days around this holiday.

The tradition is related to the belief in Catalan folklore that the Night of Sant Joan's Eve (June 23rd) is the most magical night of the year, and all herbs picked on this night or spells done this night have a stronger effect.

The tradition is to hang the bouquet on the door or above the fireplace to get dry. The bouquet can be used later in the year as medicinal herbs or be burned the next year in the Sant Joan Night's bonfires (this holiday is celebrated making bonfires). This is said to grant protection from illness and mythological beings, who tend to mess with humans on this night.

The Catalan poet Jacint Verdaguer explained a story about it in his book Canigó, published in 1886. The original poem in Catalan is under the cut, here's the translation to English:

Saint John's Day is a great holiday, the Pyrenean girls place a bouquet on the door since there was one of them, with blue eyes and blonde eyebrow, with a star on her forehead and a rose on each cheek. A fallaire [=men who carry the lit giant torches down the mountain for the tradition] caught her eye, it seems like a big sparrow hawk alluring a dove. On Saint John's morning, the little dove flies flies to the river bank to search for good fortune. She picks a small bouquet of flowers the best fortune that can be found. Saint John's wort, rosemary and thyme, and with them she makes a cross and with it she crowns the farmhouse's lintel. When her suitor arrives, he doesn't dare to come in; she says, from inside the house: "Why do you stay outside?" "Because you bar my way through the door with the flowers of that bunch." "You are scared of a little bouquet?" "I am scared of its shape of winding tool." "It's not a winding tool's shape, it's a cross; and if you're scared of that, you're no good thing." "For I am the Devil, the spirit who takes souls. Had it not been for the little bouquet, yours would be my wife, and today we would lay together on my bed of fire and sulphur." Since this happened, on a Saint John's morning, up the riverbanks of the Garona, from the Cantabric Sea to Roses, the girls of the Pyrenees place a bouquet on the door.

Photos from Xarxa de Parcs de les Olors, Centre d'Estudis Mitològics de Catalunya and Canigó, la montagne sacrée des catalans.

Lo dia de Sant Joan n’és dia de festa grossa, les nines del Pirineu posen un ram a la porta, d’ençà que una n’hi hagué d’ulls blavencs i cella rossa, tenia una estrella al front i a cada galta una rosa. Un fallaire li ha caigut a l’ull, ¡malhaja la brossa! n’apar un esparverot que fa l’aleta a una tórtora. Lo matí de Sant Joan la tortoreta se’n vola, se’n vola voreta el riu a cercar ventura bona. Un ramellet cull de flors, millor ventura no troba, floretes de Sant Joan, de romaní i farigola, i amb elles fent una creu del mas la llinda en corona. Quan arriba el seu galant a la casa entrar no gosa; ella li diu des de dins: –Doncs Per què et quedes defora? –Perquè em barres lo portal amb les flors d’aqueixa toia. –Un ramellet te fa por? –Me fa por d’aspi sa forma. –No és d’aspi, no, que és de creu; si et fa por, no ets cosa bona. –Doncs só el maligne esperit que les ànimes s’emporta. Si no fos lo ramellet la teva fóra ma esposa, avui jauríem plegats en mon jaç de foc i sofre.– D’ençà que això succeí, lo matí de Sant Joan, ribera amunt del Garona, des del Cantàbric a Roses, les nines del Pirineu posen un ram a la porta.

[useless-catalanfacts]

June 23rd is the night of Saint John's Eve, the most magical night of the year according to Catalan legends. Tonight, mythical creatures will be around pranking humans and many secrets will be revealed, only to be closed off again when the sun rises. One of the many legends that take place tonight happens in the Medieval castle of Montsoriu (Comarques Gironines, Catalonia; the top photo in this post).

Every year on Saint John's Night, when the bell tower in the town of Breda's church (2nd photo) rings midnight, the bells echo throughout the valley and reach Montsoriu castle, at the top of the mountain. Immediately with the first bell, a gate opens in the castle. This gate leads to a chamber full of wheat and bran.

If, tonight, someone were to walk backwards, holding a lit candle on one hand and a skull on the other; took the wheat with his teeth, putting it inside a sack, and hurried to exit the chamber through the same door; once outside the castle and passed the stream, when he looked inside the sack, he would find that all the wheat has become gold.

But whoever wants to try it must be careful. Firstly, to be patient: if the intruder is too curious or greedy and looks inside the sack before crossing the stream, he will find that everything inside the sack has become sand.

But most importantly, the intruder must be quick: the door opens with the first bell and closes with the last of the 12 bells that ring midnight. If the intruder doesn't manage to leave in time, he will be stuck inside the chamber, with no chance of escaping, because the door won't open again until next year.

Photos: Montsoriu castle by jordi domènech on Wikimedia & Breda by Turisme a Catalunya.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Photos and short video showing the Dance of the Eagles and Hairy Saint John (Ball de les àguiles i Sant Joan Pelós) parading in Pollença, Mallorca (Balearic Islands).

The most characteristic element in Pollença's procession for the festivity of Corpus Sunday is this dance. The procession walks the streets and squares of the town which inhabitants decorate with palm and pine leafs, and is met with flower petals that the inhabitants throw from the windows and balconies.

What does the dance represent?

There are three characters. First, Hairy Saint John. He's a barefoot man with long hair wearing the Saint John costume, a wooden mask, with red lines drawn on his feet and legs to represent sandals, and carrying a wooden cross and a shepherd's bag with a lamb inside it. He represents Saint John the Baptist, a preacher who lived an austere life and lead the ritual of baptism in Jesus's times. He dances for the whole time the procession lasts.

He is followed by the eagles: two girls who have the figure of an eagle attached to their waist. The girls are selected to look as similar to each other as possible, with twins being preferred. They perform a very simple dance while playing the castanets (they will perform a more complex dance in the church and in the houses of important people of the town).

These girls wear a dress with many embroidered jewels on the head, torso, and hands. These jewels are given by people from Pollença as offerings some days before Corpus when the girls go house by house performing a dance. The jewels then are embroidered on the clothes and will be returned to their owners after the holiday. As a result of these jewels, the clothes the girls wear weight up to 5 kg.

Why so many jewels?

This has to do with the origin of this dance. Originally, this dance used to be performed on the festivity of Saint John (Midsummer) instead of Corpus. Around the Catalan Countries, it used to be common to lay coins and other gold objects under the sun on the festivity of Saint John, which was said to propitiate the wealth to multiply. It's thought that the eagles wear all these golden jewels because of this.

Photos and information from festes.org.

[useless-catalanfacts]

Coca de Sant Joan 😋 the traditional dessert for the holiday of Sant Joan (Saint John's Day or Midsummer in Catalan culture).

Photos: Shutterstock, TV3.