Toro de la Vega tournament

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The bull is killed with the dagger at the Toro de la Vega , 2014.

The Toro-de-la-Vega tournament ( German  tournament bull [in] the floodplain ) is a festival lasting several days and a highlight with a medieval bullhunt in Tordesillas , Castile-León , Spain, with a population of 9,000 . A bull is driven through the village by a pack of people, only to be stabbed to death with spears on the southern bank of the Rio Duero in the midst of an open area wooded with pine trees , as tradition requires . If the bull reaches a certain limit during the tournament or the lancers fail to kill him, he will be pardoned.

history

The first documentary mentions about the tradition were made in 1534 ; the tournament itself only got underway in 1355 , in honor of the patron saint of Tordesillas, Virgen de la Peña , on September 8th and traditionally on the second Tuesday in September. Under dictator Franco there was a ban as early as 1966; however, the tournament was allowed again in 1970 due to popular pressure. At the Toro de la Vega tournament , the lances cause fatal injuries; however, the bull is always killed with a stab in the back.

But the protests against bull killing never stopped, and over time, more and more people around the world revolted. Several animal welfare organizations did not give up and fought against this Spanish tradition by killing animals. The success of the animal rights activists came in 2016 when the government of Castile and León first banned the killing of the bull at the tournament.

Protests and bull killing bans

Due to numerous protests by animal rights activists and the animal party PACMA , which have long called for a general ban on all fiestas “with cruelty to animals”, the regional government of Castile and León issued a decree on June 8, 2016 that banned all traditional folk festivals (“fiestas”) in which the animals are publicly killed. All folk festivals at which the cattle are traditionally mistreated, beaten and injured must therefore change their rules. The decree is intended to adapt the traditional tournament to the “culture and sensitivity of the 21st century ”.

The return of the protest by the socialist mayor of Tordesillas, José Antonio González Poncela, according to which a tradition that has been going on since 1534 "the neck is broken" was of no use.

In return, on September 10, 2016, around 80,000 supporters demonstrated at a rally on Madrid's Puerta del Sol for a general ban on bull killing and called for a general ban on all fiestas “involving cruelty to animals”.

Name change

Since the decree ban on bull killing, bull hunting has been called Toro de la Peña since September 13, 2016 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Toro de la Vega - The Beginning of the End . soso-galgos.net. Accessed September 13, 2016
  2. ↑ Castilla y León Deniega la autorización para celebrar el Toro de la Vega . elpais.com. From June 28, 2016 (Spanish)
  3. ↑ Slaughterhouse instead of lance . faz.net, September 12, 2016
  4. ↑ La Junta de Castilla y León prohibe a Tordesillas celebrar el Toro de la Vega si hay muerte del animal . elmundo.es. From June 28, 2016 (Spanish)
  5. ↑ La rebelión de Tordesillas . elmundo.es. May 20, 2016 (Spanish)
  6. ↑ PACMA desborda las calles de Madrid con su 'Misión Abolición' . pacma.es. Accessed September 13, 2016 (Spanish)
  7. ↑ El Toro de la Vega 2016 . elpais.com. From September 13, 2016 (Spanish)