| Les Festes de Santa Eulàlia |
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Fiesta de Santa Eulalia 2010 Barcelona
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Event date: Fri 12th to Sun 14th February 2010
Event location: Various venues Barcelona - see links and programme further down this page
"Les Festes de Santa Eulàlia" is
Barcelona’s biggest annual festival for children. The festival of Santa
Eulàlia is also known as "La Laia" festival. The main festival events
are usually in the days around 12th February each year, which is Santa
Eulàlia's day. The Santa Eulàlia festival programme has more than a
hundred activities of all kinds and mostly for children. Activities include street parades with giants and other fantasy
figures, "Castellers", sardanas
dancing, correfocs, story-telling, puppets, family workshops,
talks, concerts and many other events are on the programme for the
festival. You can see links to the programme further down this page.
Other traditional Catalan festival events include "Diada Castellera" on Sunday 14th Feb 2010 from 12..30 on Pl de Sant Jaume . (day of human
castle building). There will be plenty of a giants ball and plenty of music.
Another big event on is the Santa Eulalia “correfoc” in a children's and adult version. The children's version is the fire-runs of the "petits diables" (little devils.) from 18.30 on Sunday 14th Feb 2010 which also starts also at Pl
de Sant Jaume. The 2010 adult "Correfoc de Santa Eulalia" starts from Plaza Nova at "Avinguda de la Catedral " at 20.00
Music plays an very
important part in this festival and throughout the festivities, music
schools, choirs and children's orchestras will perform around the city of Barcelona. "La Laia" also include a childrens photography competition called the "Foto Laia" and
the “Premis Ciutat de Barcelona” awards for shopkeepers at the end of the festival. Each year there is a new
poster for the Santa Eulàlia festival. In 2010 the artist Sonja Wimmer has created an delightful poster. In 2008 the poster
featured two historic buildings in Barcelona: the Santa Maria del Mar church and the Cathedral of Barcelona which are part of the legend of Santa Eulalia.
The story of the child virgin saint, Saint Eulàlia (ca. 290-303) is a gruesome tale. Legend has it that she was a thirteen-year-old Christian girl who lived in a farmhouse ( un mas) in what is now the district of Sarria, which was then outside the city in the countryside. She became a martyr in Barcelona during the persecution of Christians in the reign of
emperor Diocletian. She protested teh persecution of Christians to Roman consul Dacià and was tortured for refusing to recant her Christian faith.
The Romans
subjected her to not just one, but thirteen different and gruesome tortures;
including stripping her naked into a barrel with filled with glass and embedded knives and
rolling it down the sloping street in Barcelona's gothic area, which now has the name “Baixada de Santa Eulalia” meaning "Saint Eulalia's descent."
Other tortures
included cutting off her breasts, crucifying her on an X-shaped cross
and other barbaric cruelties until her final decapitation. Legend has it that a
dove flew from her neck after she lost her head. Eulàlia is commemorated
with many statues and street names throughout Barcelona. She represents justice, solidarity and youth and is also a co-patron saint of Barcelona along with "la Mare de Déu de la Mercè."
She died on
12th February 303, which is now celebrated as Saint Eulàlia’s day. Eulalia's body was first interred in a church originally called "Santa
Maria de les Arenes" - St. Mary of the Sands. which was on the present location of the church "Santa
Maria del Mar" - St. Mary of the Sea, in the Born area of
Barcelona. Her remains were hidden in 713 during the Moorish invasion,
and only recovered again in 878. In 1339, they were relocated to an
alabaster sarcophagus in the crypt of the Barcelona
church of Santa Eulalia. And later again they were moved to the crypt of Barcelona Cathedral, where they remain to this day and you can see the remains in the crypt.
Thirteen white geese, one for each year of her life, now live in the cloister of the cathedral in the "Well of the Geese" "Fuente de las Ocas." Geese grazed in the area where she lived. She died on
12th February 303, which is now celebrated as Saint Eulàlia’s day.
Visit the
official website below (in Catalan and Spanish) for more information about events or
visit your local library, civic centre and market, where they will be information about activities in your area.
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