Pauliteiros de Miranda | Traditional dance & costumes from Portugal
The Pauliteiros de Miranda are groups of men who dance traditional rhythms, from the high-plateau of Miranda, in Bragança, located in the northeastern region of Portugal, called Trás-os-Montes (portuguese for "behind the mountains"). The name pauliteiro derives from the word paulito, meaning small stick.
These male stick dancers would then dance the dança dos paulitos or, in the Mirandese language (astur-Leonese dialect), la dança and dança de palotes. The dance is characterized by the use of two sticks that the dancers hit to the rhythm of the music played by the gaiteiros, a musical group composed by a bagpipe, a small and big drum. It is performed by eight men in a specific costume, usually comprising with white embroidered skirts, woollen socks, decorated vests (coletes).
The Pauliteiros have been subject of reflection by many people who try to interpret the origin and symbolism of the dance and the costumes. The fact that the groups are made up exclusively of single men points to either a warlike dance, where sticks replace what once were swords (or a sword and a shield), reminiscence of the Pyrrhic Greek Dances, that was overtaken by Romans, which with the expansion of the empire ended up in the Iberian peninsula (former Hispania).
Or, a dance rite from the indo-European peoples who settled in the peninsula before Rome 'latinized' them, the so-called Celts or pre-Celts. It would initially have a ritualistic choreography to celebrate the cycles, especially those that emphasize fertility, who, would then developed to be a type of sword dance eventually mixed with Greco-Roman steps and other forms of medieval dancing. In turn, they were quickly widespread and were performed by guilds in Corpus Christi processions.
