Medicinal waters and moldy air
- Zestoa, around 1760. The dog of the Marqués de San Millán found wells of hot water. He was sick with scabies and the dog had been cured in these wells. The resort was opened in 1804, becoming the first tourist facility in Euskal Herria. Starting in 1893, more tourists began to arrive after the construction of the Gran Hotel. And in the happy 1920s, the influence of the outsiders began to emerge in the mentalities and customs of the Zestoarras, among them dance, as Fernando Arzallus recently gathered in the popular magazine Danbolin.
Arzallus received a release from 1928 in the festival program twenty years ago. The document shows that, after the May festivities of that year, the mayor banned related dances, which "outraged" the citizens. The municipal authorities discussed the response of the Zestoa neighbours and took up the paper debate.
Herita Félix Zunzunegi said that “he is not in favour of related dance, let alone of that vertiginous dance that dances in the plaza here; that he asks to do what is done in the surrounding villages, in Azpeitia and Azkoitia (…); that he is in favour of music but not of erotic dance and that, therefore, it seems inappropriate.” In Azpeitia and Azkoitia they seemed to have solved the problem, but the erotic dances that came from outside in the surrounding villages were not as entrenched as in Zestoa.
The mayor, Ramón Izeta, agreed with Zunzunegi, but knew that “musicians were against playing only loose dances, so he considered it appropriate to leave all dancers to submerge, but the protests have reached that level and it is not possible not to give what they ask.” So he made a compromise proposal: to touch one piece loose and the other tied.
Antonio Egiguren’s decision, both on one side and on the other, was unanimously adopted to avoid further confrontations, and the mayor’s proposal was finally accepted: “Let the band touch one loose piece and another tied, but at the time of the angelus, that is to say at dusk, with the condition of finishing everything.” But “let it not be called a dance that is considered scandalous, such as fox-trot, charleston, tangos, etc.”
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In contradiction to the... [+]
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