Fiestas del Pilar from 8 to 16 october
For ten days in the month of October, Zaragoza is bursting with festivities and filled with fun. The capital of Aragon becomes a city of joy, imaginative, colourful and, above all, it displays its well-earned reputation for being a city which always gives a warm welcome to visitors. The Fiestas del Pilar are the last grand fiestas of the year chosen by artists of renown in order to finalise their tours.
The people of Zaragoza spend much time in the streets and participate in each of the acts which take place there. Throughout the year, the neighbours stroll through and enjoy a city transformed. Since 2008, it has fully integrated the River Ebro into its daily life. Added to monumental Zaragoza, there is now added a new Zaragoza, the one of the XXI century, a modern and accessible Zaragoza which thus completes its impressive historical legacy.
If there is a time of the year when Zaragoza becomes the centre of national, and even global, attention, this is during the Fiestas del Pilar. This year, they will take Place from October 8 to16.
Zaragoza will treble its population, amounting to 700.000 persons, and will host more than a thousand cultural and fun acts so that old and young, the citizens of Zaragoza and visitors can find customised activities to their tastes.
90% of the acts which make up the festive programme are free of charge and their scenarios are the streets. The squares of the Historical Quarter become emblematic stages which become the venues for a grand street theatre festival, a circus, dancing and humour, percussion, clowns and miming, folklore groups from Aragon and other Autonomous Communities and grand concerts with artists of renown at national and international level.
However, the grand act of the Fiestas del Pilar, the one people from the city and beyond live to the maximum, is the Flower Offering of October 12. On that day, the Patroness of the Hispanic World also comes out into the street, specifically into the Plaza del Pilar, to be lifted to a huge metallic pyramid. The citizens, dressed in regional costumes, then place between six and eight million flowers at her feet. A unique act in the world which impresses the people of Zaragoza and the visitors.
As a result of all this, the Fiestas del Pilar fill Zaragoza with revelry and fun for ten days besides transforming it into the centre of attention of the South of Europe.
The Fiestas del Pilar is the shop window in which the city shows its best aspects and its most characteristic essence.
HISTORY AND TRADITION
THE DAWN ROSARY
The Dawn Rosary is the first religious act which takes place in the early morning. A tradition which dates from the VIII century and which has lasted to our time. This procession brings together hundreds of the faithful who walk through the streets of the city centre, from the Parish of San Pablo to the Basílica del Pilar.
TONS OF FRUIT FOR THE VIRGEN DEL PILAR
During the morning of October 13, the Regional Associations established in the city offer the Virgen del Pilar a wide variety of fruits. All the fruit collected each year, is subsequently transferred to Care Centres in the city. This act has become one of the most striking and colourful of the fiestas.
LAMPS AND MYSTERIES LIGHT UP THE CAPITAL OF ARAGON
The procession of the Rosario de Cristal is another of the multitudinous acts which are held. A tradition which lights up the streets of Zaragoza on the evening of October 13 and which creates much expectation among the citizens and visitors.
Hundreds of persons, wearing the regional costume, walk in procession accompanied by the traditional mysteries and glass lamps which symbolise each of the parts of the prayer of the rosary.
GRAND HOMAGE TO THE PATRONESS OF THE HISPANIC WORLD
The most emblematic act celebrated during the Fiestas del Pilar: the Flower Offering, takes place on October 12. From early in the morning until late in the evening, hundreds of thousands of citizens of Aragon and from all over the world congregate in the main and adjacent streets of the city in order to place their flowers before the Virgen del Pilar and pay homage to the Patroness of the Hispanic World. At the endo of the day, between six and eight million flowers have been placed creating a scene which is unique in the world.
The Flower Offering has become a tradition passed on from parents to children and is an example of mass participation. However, it is also an example of tradition renewed.
From early in the morning, hundreds of thousands of citizens from Aragon, other Autonomous Communities and from all over the world, dressed in their regional costumes (the only requisite to participate), walk in procession in front of the Virgen and place at her feet millions of flowers brought as homage to the Patroness of the people of Aragon and of the community of the Hispanic World. All day long, one can sense in the air the joy of those who come to render their small homage in the form of a flower to the Virgen del Pilar.
HISTORY
The beginnings of the Offering must be sought in the forties of the XX century when the Chapel of the Virgen was decorated for feast days. Carnations, roses and spikenards scent the air of the Holy Chapel. However, it was in 1958, when Luis Gómez Laguna was Mayor of Zaragoza that the Councillor for Festivals, Manuel Rodeles, added a popular, participatory act to the programme, similar to the flower offerings held in eastern Spain.
FIRST STAGE
On Sunday October 12, 1958, the first Flower Offering to the Virgen del Pilar took place. During the two hours which that first edition lasted, approximately 2,000 persons took part in the procession. For this first offering, for which a replica of the Virgen was placed in the main façade of the temple, the Town Hall acquired several thousand carnations in Tortosa. In 1960 it was considered to be "traditional". In 1964 it was the main theme of the front pages of the extraordinary editions of the press. That year, the flowers contributed by the Town Hall amounted to 8,000 dozen carnations; the next year, more than 5,000 persons (the majority were women and children) attended and there were more than 12,000 dozen flowers, which gives an idea of how strongly this act had taken root.
Undoubtedly, the success of the Flower Offering contributed to the fact that the Fiestas del Pilar were declared to be "Fiestas of National Touristic Interest" in 1965.
SECOND STAGE
With the arrival of the democratic Town Halls, the Flower Offering, which was then the paradigm of the traditions of the Fiestas del Pilar, was reinterpreted as an act of reaffirmation of the Aragonese identity, with the immense majority of the people of Zaragoza, committed to participating, as shown by the fact that 50,000 citizens participated in it in 1980.
THIRD STAGE
In 1998, the Film Director, Bigas Luna, who knew the fiesta well advocated changing the location to another angle of the Plaza del Pilar and the result was more than satisfactory. The Virgen is situated in the centre of the Plaza, so that the Offering gained impressiveness and the surface area of the mantle, which has flowers woven into it, is 55 metres deep, 18 metres wide and 15 metres high.
The Offering has continued to grow at a constant pace: in contrast with the 2,000 participants of 1958, at the beginning of the XXI century, fair calculations estimated a flow of 25,000 persons offering flowers per hour during the eight hours the uninterrupted procession lasts, and these placed approximately seven million flowers.
THE IMAGE OF THE OFFERING
The image, including the height of the crown and the mantle, measures more than 3 metres, while the complete structure measures approximately 7 metres. This is very solid as it is prepared to withstand the north wind which can blow in Zaragoza and it is especially high up so that it can be seen from the entire square.
ORIGIN OF THE OFFERING OF THE CROSS OF LORRAINE TO THE VIRGEN DEL PILAR
The Cross of Lorraine (red cross with two bars) has been the world symbol of the fight against tuberculosis since October 1902 and this is why it was chosen to be offered in the Flower Offering on the day of the Virgen del Pilar, from what was then called the Tuberculosis Sanatorium "El Cascajo", now the Hospital General Royo Villanova.
It is made of red carnations and is mounted on the mantle which has carnations and white gladiolas woven into it.
The origin of this tradition has been linked to the Offering since its early years: one of the patients who had been admitted to this hospital received frequent visits from a high official of the Town Hall of Zaragoza. In their conversations they were joined by Dr. Val Calvete, who was directly responsible for the attention given to this patient, and he suggested that the Hospital offer the Cross of Lorraine to the Virgen del Pilar at the Flower Offering.
When deciding who would be responsible for carrying the cross, they became aware that it was a problem to have the patients admitted to the hospital carry it. The hospital staff could not decide who should carry it. It was then that the representative of the Town Hall proposed that the Queen of the Fiestas of the Pilar and her Maids of Honour should carry the cross to the mantle of the Virgen.
That is why, October 12, 1960 was the date on which the first offering of the Cross of Lorraine was made by the Queen of the Fiestas of that year, Miss María del Carmen Claramunt Uriarte.
It continued in this way until the concept of the Queen of the Fiestas of Zaragoza disappeared in 1979. During the next 2 or 3 years, the cross was carried by former patients who had been discharged some days before, accompanied by healthcare personnel.
At the present time, this is done by an association called the ?Cross of Lorraine Association? founded in 2006 and mainly formed by personnel of the Hospital Royo Villanova and friends who are entrusted with ensuring that this tradition is not lost and the Cross of Lorraine can continue to embellish the mantle year after year.
