Photos and short video showing the Dance of the Eagles and Hairy Saint John (Ball de les àguiles i Sant Joan Pelós) parading in Pollença, Mallorca (Balearic Islands).
The most characteristic element in Pollença's procession for the festivity of Corpus Sunday is this dance. The procession walks the streets and squares of the town which inhabitants decorate with palm and pine leafs, and is met with flower petals that the inhabitants throw from the windows and balconies.
What does the dance represent?
There are three characters. First, Hairy Saint John. He's a barefoot man with long hair wearing the Saint John costume, a wooden mask, with red lines drawn on his feet and legs to represent sandals, and carrying a wooden cross and a shepherd's bag with a lamb inside it. He represents Saint John the Baptist, a preacher who lived an austere life and lead the ritual of baptism in Jesus's times. He dances for the whole time the procession lasts.
He is followed by the eagles: two girls who have the figure of an eagle attached to their waist. The girls are selected to look as similar to each other as possible, with twins being preferred. They perform a very simple dance while playing the castanets (they will perform a more complex dance in the church and in the houses of important people of the town).
These girls wear a dress with many embroidered jewels on the head, torso, and hands. These jewels are given by people from Pollença as offerings some days before Corpus when the girls go house by house performing a dance. The jewels then are embroidered on the clothes and will be returned to their owners after the holiday. As a result of these jewels, the clothes the girls wear weight up to 5 kg.
Why so many jewels?
This has to do with the origin of this dance. Originally, this dance used to be performed on the festivity of Saint John (Midsummer) instead of Corpus. Around the Catalan Countries, it used to be common to lay coins and other gold objects under the sun on the festivity of Saint John, which was said to propitiate the wealth to multiply. It's thought that the eagles wear all these golden jewels because of this.
Photos and information from festes.org.
