THE FALLAS
My daughter told me, she is taking her children this year to the‘ Fallas’. Fair enough, it is part of their heritage as children of a man from Valencia, and the Fallas have also since 2016 UNESCO‘ World Cultural Heritage of Humanity’ status.
I had always thought they were a kind of Carnival and therefore one expected them to be in February, but no, they are in the middle of March. They are a traditional celebration held in commemoration of St Joseph in the city of Valencia, whose patron saint he is.
Now, St Joseph’ s day is the 19 March. Usually a Saints day is the day associated with the death of a saint, but since nobody knows when and where St Joseph died, the church pronounced the 19 th of March as his day. St Joseph is also the patron saint of carpenters, maybe that is why the Fallas are associated with him, since the‘ Fallas’ are not only the name of the festival, but also the name of the wooden structures which are carried around the city in procession and are burnt as part of the festival.
Each part of the city has an organised group of people that works all year round building their‘ falla’ and holding fundraisings for their part in the procession. Artists and craftsmen spend months preparing their construction from wood, paper, wax and polystyrene foam. The structures are up to 5 stories high and usually represent some satirical scene of local or national politics. That is why they were banned during the time of the dictatorship of Franco. At the festival during 5 days of continuous street parties and multiple processions, people wear medieval costumes, and there are continuously fireworks and noisemakers in the streets. On the final night of the festival around midnight of March 19 the fallas are burnt in huge fires.
The festival is said to be of medieval origin, the burning explained by the habit of artisans disposing of their broken leftover wood. Carpenters are said to have used wooden structures to hold the candles which lit up their workshops during winter and are not needed in the spring. Yet the festival is probably much older and, like bonfires at St John’ s night, represents some pagan ritual, here to welcome spring. The Church has refashioned it into some Christian festival by associating it with St Joseph.
StOM Page 11