Spanish Castle Magic: living towers made of humans

Video by Mike Randolph:

In the city of Tarragona, Spain, castellers gather every two years to see who can build the highest, most intricate human castles. This uniquely Catalan tradition requires astonishing strength, finesse, and balance. Not to mention courage.

Here are more photos of this amazing sport.

(thanks, Clayton Cubitt)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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I’ve seen this in Barcelona. One of the joys of just wandering around.
lewisfrancis

Yup, wormman beat me to the Clive Barker’s “In the Hills, The Cities” pointer — well done.
- Rickmccl
  
  me four! Now I want to check the basement when I get home, I think I still have the comic book version.
SamSam

BoingBoing posted a great video a couple weeks ago of a young girl going up one of these towers with a camera on her helmet(?). Does anyone remember where that was? I can’t find it.
- Anonymous
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3TQElGe91o
  - SamSam
    
    Wow, that was a totally different video from the one that BoingBoing posted. I guess a bunch of people had that idea.
foxtails

As opposed to dead towers made of humans.
billstewart

The Berbers in Morocco do similar kinds of acrobatic stunts as entertainment. Maybe not quite as big a tower, but I’ve seen five or six guys all climb into various arrangements; it’s really impressive. Moroccan restaurants may have belly dancers because that’s what the tourists want, but the acrobatics are more traditional.
Anonymous

Beats the StooperBowl any day!
meanthinking

This kind of thing happens in many neighbourhoods in Mumbai, India every year – during the festival of Krishna’s birth. The human pyramids are also a competition between residential neighbourhoods and can get quite crazy…See pics:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ashish_tibrewal/216775860/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ashish_tibrewal/216767410/in/photostream/
http://bombaystreets.com/archives/1011
EH

This would never, ever happen in the US, and I don’t even think the Texas A&M bonfire collapse would have been necessary for this state of affairs.
Anonymous

Only one precision: it’s not an spanish castle magic, it’s a catalan castle magic
Donald Petersen

Wow. That tower with the seafoam green-shirted, white-pantsed crew. You see the helmeted kids clambering down at around 1:16. At that point, the four top layers of the tower contain 16 people. Some are small 45-pound kids, the rest have to be 100-pound (at least) teens.

If the average weight of those 16 people is 75 pounds, then the four people down on layer #5 are each supporting 300 lbs on their shoulders. And I bet it’s more than that.

I think I sprained something just watching that. Amazing!
Anonymous

It’s culturally Catalan, not Spanish. Spain is a state comprising several countries with different cultures (and languages).
Antinous / Moderator

Do they have any cultural activities that don’t involved sharp lessons in gravity, conflagrations or angry bovines?
- Anonymous
  
  Well, bullfighting has been forbidden in Catalonia :)
- sapere_aude
  
  There’s this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomatina
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    Oh, lord. Don’t put out bait for the anti-food-waster trolls.
anansi133

It’s like the live theatrical version of World Of Goo.
- Wyrd
  
  Exactly what I was thinking! I have to play that again today
- Wormman
  
  Looks to me like the pre-cursor to Clive Barker’s “In the Hills, The Cities”.
  - Derek C. F. Pegritz
    
    Damnit! You beat me to it. :)
    - saehn
      
      “stale incense old sweat and lies lies lies” :-)
    - Wormman
      
      It’s all a lot of fun until they start strapping themselves into vast humanoid conformations and beating the snot out of each other.
  - tad604
    
    Came for the Clive Barker reference. Glad I’m not the only one who immediately thought of that.
David Llopis

Universal healthcare!
Photos are so deceiving since in reality it’s all about the shaking & straining & vibrating.
iguanoid

I bet there are some really cool families that enter that event.
facetedjewel

Watching this all I can see are compressed discs. No one’s spine should be put under that much pressure. As a parent I’d be a little apprehensive about letting my kid climb to the top.
blorgggg

This is heavily featured in the weird movie, “The Tit and the Moon”
VICTOR JIMENEZ

All the peoples of the Iberian peninsula have a astounding disregard for the Laws of Thermodynamics. We are that cool.
Anonymous

This looks like a page from Where’s Waldo!
Sekino

Okay, it looks dangerous as heck. But there is something unusual and heartwarming in seeing adult men and women, teenagers and little kids all working together, equally, for a common goal.

That and it demands an impressive amount of strenght and focus from all involved. Wow!
ToMajorTom

While I hope no one was seriously injured, I have to admit that the collapses were pretty awesome to watch.
Goorpy

Kind of like one of our rituals in Queen’s Engineering: The Greasepole climb.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV6-l9Q55bg
Anonymous

The video is beautiful the subject is cringe-worthy and amazing.