ENTROIDO de LAZA - Galicia, Spain
In the Galician region of Spain carnival is known as Entroido, or Beginning. In the village of Laza the Entroido de Laza combines Christian traditions with ancient rites and is a vibrant part of village life.
Monday is the "dirty" and "wild" day of the Entroido. The farrapada (ragging) in the main plaza of the village is an all-out mud war lasting more than two hours. Young men also go into the countryside to dig up anthills and collect the ant-filled dirt, which they shovel into sacks and carry back to town. They douse the ants with vinegar to wake them up and then run into the plaza flinging dirt and ants into the air, into peoples' faces, or right down their backs and into their clothes.
The morena, or cow masquerader, appears briefly during the ant-throwing episode. This character acts like a mad cow loose in the square, butting people, lifting women's skirts, and adding to the sense of chaos. Its carved wooden mask is attached to one end of a long pole that
the masker manipulates with aggressive gestures as he makes his way through the crowd.
Peliqueiros run through in the streets on Sunday morning and the distinctive sound of the large bells hanging from their waists tells everyone that the entroido has begun. These masqueraders, authority figures in Laza's Carnival, carry whips to hit bystanders as a reminder that it is time to play. The exact origin of their elaborate costume and mask is unknown. However, some locals say the Peliqueiros' outfit and mannerisms derive from 16th-century tax collectors who carried whips and wore masks with grimacing smiles to intimidate the townspeople.
At dusk on Tuesday afternoon people gather in the main plaza for one of the last events of the Entroido de Laza, the testamento do burro, or Testament of the Donkey, which presents a satirical and mocking recounting of scandalous events that occurred in the village during the past year. Prepared and read by the testamenteiro, it is a rhymed verse written in the Galician form of Spanish. Using a fictional framework, the reader verbally "distributes" body parts of the donkey to the townspeople he is talking about. For example, a man who lost his pig from the back of his truck on the way to market received the eyes of the donkey so that he might keep better track of his animals.
RESOURCES
More information on Entroido de Laz
Make a Peliqueiros mask
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