The Gegant Queen
Dances three metres up · Keeper of the festival parades
Gegants are festival giants three to four metres tall, each carried by one person hidden under the skirts. Barcelona has paraded them for more than 500 years.
The legend
Gegants are giant festival figures, three to four metres tall, each carried by one person hidden under the skirts. They dance through Barcelona's streets at the Mercè festival every September, spinning so their robes fly out. The city has paraded giants for more than 500 years.
“I'd ask how she sees where she's going.”
Where it comes from
The oldest written mention of a giant in Barcelona dates from 1424. That year the city's book of ceremonies records "King David with the giant" taking part in the Corpus Christi procession. They are the oldest documented giants in Catalonia.
The keeper is inspired by the giant queens who dance beside their kings. The city's own pair, the Gegants de la Ciutat, are King Jaume I and Queen Violant of Hungary. Violant stands 4.35 metres tall and Jaume 4.40 metres. The figures that dance today are copies made in 1992 of a pair that Francesc Labarta designed for the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition, and their costumes were renewed in 2017. Under Franco's dictatorship the pair were renamed Fernando and Isabel, after the Catholic Monarchs.
Where to see it
The Casa dels Entremesos, at Plaça de les Beates 2, is free and shows the Gegants del Pi with the city's old festival beasts and other figures. Guided theatre visits run on the first Sunday of each month at 11:30 and 12:30. During the Mercè in September, the city giants stand on show with the rest of the procession figures at the Palau de la Virreina on La Rambla. In 2023 a separate exhibition at the Casa de la Caritat gathered around 100 giants from the city's neighbourhoods.
In the game
The Gegant spins once, her skirts swirling out, and dips her crown to the plane. The Gegant wobbles, sets her crown straight and keeps dancing. The Gegant opens her arms wide and waves with both. Down in the street, a drum gives one last beat.
