Semana Santa in Andalucia
By Tina Baumgartner
24 April 2008
All week long processions take place during day and night time in the villages and cities of Andalucia. The most well-known Semana Santa festivities take place in Sevilla but it is just as much fun - or even more - to watch them in the villages and small towns. We stayed in Frigiliana, one of the "white villages" of Andalucia and took trips to Malaga and Ronda to see Semana Santa in all its glory.
The history behind the Semana Santa festivities is actually quite interesting. They date back to the 16th century when the Catholic Church was desperately looking for ways to keep their flock together and away from the heretic new movements within the church. Since most people could not read or write it seemed like a good idea to speak to people through processions and emotions. And what better time of the year than Holy Week when Jesus was crucified and the resurrected on Easter Sunday? Turns out it probably was a pretty good idea as the tradition still thrives today and from the smallest kids to the old people everybody participates.
During the processions people are wearing "nazarenos" or penitential robes that cover the entire body with a tunic and sometimes a cloak and hide head and face under a hood with a conical tip also called a "capriote". At least that how most participants look. In Frigiliana people wear more like veils that cover their heads and faces - same idea though.
The nazarenos are typically white or black but violet, green and red are common as well. Again a bit of history: the use of robes for penitence goes all the way back to the 14th century when the pope prohibited any public display of self-flagellation. Since the desire for self-flagellation seemed to have run deep people came up with the idea to hide their faces and carry on in anonymity. The hoods are still part of the tradition today, the self-flagellation, though, seems to have lost pretty much all of its appeal. To the modern day observer from the US the outfits look eerily like Ku Klux Klan robes which is actually no coincidence, the Semana Santa robes and hoods served as the basis for the traditional uniform for members of the Ku Klux Klan, which is - ironically - a very anti-Catholic organization.
Processions take place during day and night time in total silence interrupted only by the occasional band playing solemn music. Even the little kids behave fairly well, are quite and concentrate hard not to stumble over the long robe of the guys marching in front of them. In addition to the hooded sinners seeking penitence there are large, heavy floats displaying biblical scenes and - always - the Virgin Mary. Participants are sometimes dressed like the 12 apostles or evil Roman legionnaires - or at least how modern day Spaniards think evil Roman legionnaires looked like.
During the night participants carry candles and at least in Frigiliana they turn off the lights in the entire town for better effect. The heavy floats - carried by people who look like they don't do much heavy lifting on a daily basis in real life - get carried up the steep streets and more than once the observers were holding their breath when the Virgin Mary swayed dangerously as the carriers maneuvered tight corners or had to bend down to negotiate low hanging power lines.
The excitement of Semana Santa peaks on Good Friday. Interestingly enough Easter Sunday, the day of resurrection, seems almost like an afterthought. There are day time processions in some towns, for example in Malaga. One last time the heavy floats are taken out, carried around town, the music plays and first signs of Semana Santa tiredness become visible: somebody punching a quick SMS into a cell phone while the float is set down for a break, people having little snacks along the way or making phone calls.
Then it is all over, the floats get stored away and the cofradiÂas, the brotherhoods who organize the processions and have for hundreds of years, no doubt have themselves a great time reminiscing about the wonderful time they have had and start planning for next year.
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