San Fermín

The festival

What is San Fermín

The San Fermín festivities, or Sanfermines, take over Pamplona from July 6 to 14. For nine days the old quarter of Navarre’s capital barely sleeps: there is music from dawn, a giants parade in the morning, the bull run in the morning, fireworks at night and street parties that go on late. Almost everyone wears the festival outfit—white shirt and pants or skirt, a red sash at the waist and a red neckerchief. The festival is declared of international tourist interest.

Saint Fermin, who according to tradition was the first bishop of Pamplona and died a martyr in Amiens, is co-patron of Navarre. In the Middle Ages the city celebrated him in the autumn with religious ceremonies and food for the poor; in 1591, because of bad weather in October, the town council moved the celebration to July 7, joining it to the summer fair, which already featured bullfights. The encierro began as a way to move bulls from the corrals outside the walls to the plaza where they would be fought in the afternoon, and wooden fences along the route already appear in the 18th century. In the 20th century, Ernest Hemingway’s novel The Sun Also Rises, after he first attended the festivities in 1923, spread Pamplona’s fame worldwide; a monument to the writer stands next to the bullring.

The opening is the Chupinazo: at noon on July 6, a rocket launched from the town hall balcony over the packed Plaza Consistorial starts the festivities, and everyone ties the red neckerchief around their neck. Those who cannot fit in the square follow on giant screens set up elsewhere in the city, such as Paseo de Sarasate and Plaza de los Fueros.

From July 7 to 14, every morning the bulls that will take part in that day’s bullfight run through the streets toward the bullring, accompanied by lead oxen, the cabestros, with runners in white ahead. Before the start, runners sing three times before a small image of Saint Fermin on the Cuesta de Santo Domingo, asking the saint for protection, many holding a rolled newspaper. The route is about 850 meters: it climbs the Cuesta de Santo Domingo, crosses the town-hall square, turns into Mercaderes, continues along the long Estafeta street, takes the Telefónica curve and enters the arena through the Callejón. The run usually lasts a few minutes and is marked by rockets: the first opens the corrals, the last signals that all the bulls are inside. Carpenters erect and dismantle part of the wooden fences of the route each day.

The rest of the day follows a different pace. Early on, the municipal band La Pamplonesa plays dianas through the center. After the encierro, the Comparsa de Gigantes y Cabezudos, with giants made in 1860 and cabezudos from 1890, parades the streets accompanied by pipers, and the kilikis and zaldikos chase after children. On July 7, the saint’s day, the image of Saint Fermin leaves in procession from the church of San Lorenzo through the central streets, with authorities, dantzaris, txistularis and the municipal band. In the afternoon there is a bullfight in the bullring, and the peñas, the city’s festival associations, march out in procession with their bands. At night, an international fireworks competition, a tradition dating back to the 17th century, lights the sky from the Citadel.

The ending is the Pobre de mí: at midnight on July 14, the Plaza Consistorial fills with people holding lit candles, who raise their red neckerchiefs and sing the farewell until the next year; many then leave the candle and neckerchief on the railings of the church of San Lorenzo. For visitors, San Fermín combines in one week a centuries-old religious tradition, the world-famous encierro and a street festival open to all.