Castell

Castells are human towers that are traditionally built during festivals in many places in Catalonia, Spain. At these festivals, several colles de castellers (teams) meet and try to build the most impressive towers they can.

This tradition is said to have its origins in the Tarragona province, but has now spread to many parts of Catalonia. Amongst other important festivities are the carnival in Vilanova i la Geltrú and the Patum in Berga.

Terminology

In Catalan the word castell means castle, although the tower is usually called a pilar if it consists of just one person per level.

Castells are mainly described by the number of people standing at the base and the number of levels. In the image opposite, for instance, a 3 de 7 is depicted.

The elements a castell may consist of are as follows:

• pinya: The densely arranged crowd of people at the base of the tower. Here is where most of the people are. Its function is to sustain the second level, lighten the weight on the basement people and to soften the impact if anyone falls.
• anxaneta (rider) : The topmost child.
• folre : A crowd standing on the pinya and sustaining the third level.
• manilles : A crowd standing on the folre and sustaining the fourth level.
• agulla (needle) : A single-person-per-floor tower (pilar) inside the castell, which when the castell is being undone has to remain standing until the outside part of the castell is already down.

Castells up to 10 levels have been built.

External Links

• Presentation about Castells (PDF file. Written in english) (http://personals.ac.upc.es/aramirez/papers/castells.pdf)
• List of colles castelleres and links to their web-sites (http://www.castellersdebarcelona.org/col.htm)
• Photo album of the Castellers de Barcelona (http://www.castellersdebarcelona.org/fot.htm)