Cave of Zugarramurdi
The most famous akelarre, scene of the 1610 trials.
The Akelarre
The goat's meadow where the Sorginak gathered
Quick facts
- • Place: Zugarramurdi and caves of Euskal Herria
- • Basque name: Akelarre (aker + larre)
- • Beings involved: Sorginak, Akerbeltz
- • Motifs: ritual, gathering, night, magic
- • Chronology: Documented in the 1610 trials
The Legend
The word Akelarre comes from Basque: aker means goat and larre means meadow. It was the place where the Sorginak gathered on marked nights to celebrate ancestral rites far from the eyes of ordinary people and the Church.
Zugarramurdi, near the French border, holds the most famous akelarre of all. There, according to testimonies collected during the terrible inquisitorial process of 1610, witches gathered on Friday nights. They anointed their bodies with a magic ointment, flew to the cave, and held feasts that lasted until dawn.
At the center of the akelarre stood Akerbeltz, the black goat who presided over the ceremonies. The Sorginak danced in circles, sang in ancient tongues, and shared the secrets of herbs and remedies. There, the hierarchies of human society disappeared: all were equal before knowledge.
Beyond the exaggerations of the Inquisition, the akelarre was probably the memory of old pagan rituals, gatherings where Mari was honored and pre-Christian traditions were kept alive. They were rites the Church could not tolerate and persecuted with brutal ferocity.
The mystical akelarre: forbidden assemblies of freedom
Hidden among dense thickets and remote clearings, the Basque akelarres came to embody some of the strongest memories of rural ritual life in Europe. They were imagined not only as scenes of witchcraft, but as nocturnal celebrations of fertility, knowledge, and female complicity outside official control.
In the secrecy of night, women worn down by labor or oppression could briefly imagine another order of life. Ointments, chants, fire, and ecstatic dance became the language through which hidden knowledge survived and community was renewed.
La confrontación contra la cruz dogmática
That unrestrained female nocturnal joy was incomprehensible and repulsive to the ecclesiastical authorities of the early modern age. By identifying Akerbeltz with the Christian devil, they turned older ritual forms into evidence for persecution.
Even after those festivities were crushed in public life, the legendary name of the goat's meadow retained its power. Akelarre still names, with remarkable force, the memory of the Basque witches and the fear they inspired.
