The Encierro archive · 1906

Running of the Bulls 1906: San Fermín in Pamplona

San Fermín 1906 had a bull run (encierro) every morning from Saturday, July 7, to Tuesday, July 10, and on July 9 a second herd came in at three in the morning. The paper reported the runs of July 7, 9 and 10 as passing without serious incident, and that year a film of the ring during the encierro of July 7 was shown in Pamplona.^{4, 7, 9, 10}

By Encierro · Last reviewed November 9, 2026

5runs in 4 days, July 7 to 10

6:00start, a.m.

3:00a.m., the extra run of July 9

How the fiesta ran in 1906

Before the fiesta the timbers for the fence went up at the side streets along the course: “se han colocado ya los maderos para el vallado”.¹ The bulls waited in the corrals at the Sario and in the old gas works, and fans walked out to see them.^{1, 2}

The programme for the first run set it for six, from the small corral of the Portal de Rochapea, at the bang of a rocket.³ There was one every morning from July 7 to 10. On July 9 there were two: the Lizaso bulls came in at three in the morning through the San Nicolás gate, and the Marqués del Saltillo bulls ran at six as usual.⁷

As soon as the last run was over, on July 10, the carpenters took the fence down: by the time the public left the ring, “los carpinteros habían desmontado ya el armatoste de madera”.⁹

Every known encierro of 1906, by day and ranch

The encierros of San Fermín 1906, from the Diario de Navarra programmes and reports.
Date	Run	Ranch (ganadería)	What the paper reported
July 7	1	Conde de Espoz y Mina (Carriquiri)	No unpleasant incident; the biggest crowd in the ring in years
July 8	2	José Palha	“todo rebosaba gente”
July 9, 3 a.m.	3	Lizaso	Many runners despite the hour
July 9, 6 a.m.	4	Marqués del Saltillo	Several scares from very fast bulls
July 10	5, last	Muruve	Three bulls stayed in the ring; fence taken down

The 1906 encierros, day by day

Run 1

Saturday, July 7, 1906 · Conde de Espoz y Mina

Start6:00 a.m.

IncidentsNone

The Carriquiri bulls of the Conde de Espoz y Mina, moved overnight from the Sario to the small corral of the Portal de Rochapea, were to leave at six sharp at the bang of a rocket and run the usual streets to the corrals of the ring, the programme said.³ The run passed “sin incidente alguno desagradable”, with one tense moment when a runner fell entering the ring and the bulls left him alone. The ring was fuller than it had been in years; some who could not get in climbed into the boxes.⁴ The ring that morning was filmed (see Pamplona in 1906).¹⁰

Run 2

Sunday, July 8, 1906 · José Palha

CrowdEven bigger

Sunday brought even more people than Saturday: “El encierro, los paseos, la plaza, los teatros, todo rebosaba gente.”⁴ The bulls of the day were the Portuguese bulls of José Palha.⁵

Runs 3 and 4: two in one morning

Monday, July 9, 1906 · Lizaso, then Marqués del Saltillo

First run3:00 a.m.

Second run6:00 a.m.

At three in the morning the Lizaso bulls of Pamplona came in through the San Nicolás gate; despite the hour “el número de corredores era considerable”, and the bulls reached the corral of the ring without incident. At six the Marqués del Saltillo bulls from Seville ran as usual, with more people than on the earlier days and nothing to report beyond several scares from the very quick Saltillos.^{6, 7}

Run 5, the last

Tuesday, July 10, 1906 · Muruve

IncidentsNone

“El encierro de los muruveños hízose sin novedad”: the only incident was three bulls that stayed behind in the ring for eight or ten minutes and gave the herdsmen plenty of work. By the time the public left, the carpenters had already taken down the fence.⁹ It was the fourth year the Muruve ranch had sent bulls to Pamplona.⁸

San Fermín 1906 poster (cartel)

Artist: Félix Lafuente (signature)
Dated: Pamplona, June 20, 1906
Printed by: Lit. E. Portabella, Zaragoza

A young woman dressed in the height of belle époque fashion holds a violin and bow. Ollaquindía doubts she is a real concert violinist: more likely a lady who picked up the instrument that Pablo Sarasate had made so fashionable. Behind her stands the monument to the Fueros, and in the branches above are round portraits of the musicians Sarasate, Eslava, Gayarre and Arrieta; the whole cover is “una sinfonía de nombres y símbolos musicales”.^{12, 13}

The poster names the ranches whose bulls came that year: Muruve of Seville, the Marqués del Saltillo, José Palha of Portugal, the widow of Mata (formerly the Lizaso brothers) and the Conde de Espoz y Mina of Pamplona. It also lists the morning concerts with Pablo Sarasate, electric illuminations, encierros, fireworks, giants and big-heads, and walks in the grove of La Taconera.¹³

Pamplona in 1906

On film

The encierro in a moving picture

A few days after the fiesta a film was being shown in Pamplona in four parts: the council going to San Lorenzo for the vísperas, the unveiling of the Jarauta plaque in the old calle de Pellejerías, the ring on July 7 during the encierro of the Espoz y Mina bulls, and what followed in the ring after the bulls were penned. The paper called it “una película que todo el mundo debe verla”, a film everyone should see.¹⁰

Writers in Pamplona

A dark view of the fiesta

The writer José López Pinillos, who signed as Parmeno, came to San Fermín in these years and painted Pamplona darkly in his novel Las águilas, calling the city Selvática, according to José María Iribarren as quoted by Ollaquindía.¹² On July 14 a column in the paper answered Pinillos and the writer Grandmontagne, who had described the encierro as a heap of fallen men with bulls charging left and right, and made fun of their accounts.¹¹

At the corrals

The bull and the pig

While the Muruve bulls held in the old gas works were being fed, a pig slipped in through the gate, and one of the bulls killed it.²

Photographs

Where to see old photographs

The city’s photo archive, the Fototeca de Pamplona, holds historic photographs of the encierro, free to view online.¹⁴

San Fermín 1906: questions and answers

When were the bull runs of San Fermín 1906?

San Fermín 1906 had a bull run every morning from Saturday, July 7, to Tuesday, July 10, 1906, and a second run at three in the morning on July 9: five runs in four days.^{3, 4, 7, 9}

Which ranches’ bulls ran in 1906?

The bulls of San Fermín 1906 came from the Conde de Espoz y Mina, the Pamplona ranch known as Carriquiri, on July 7; José Palha of Portugal on July 8; Lizaso at 3 a.m. and the Marqués del Saltillo at 6 a.m. on July 9; and Muruve on July 10.^{3, 5, 6, 7, 9}

Was the running of the bulls filmed in 1906?

A film shown in Pamplona after San Fermín 1906 included the bullring on July 7, 1906, during the encierro of the Espoz y Mina bulls, and the Diario de Navarra called it a film everyone should see.¹⁰

Was anyone hurt in the 1906 running of the bulls?

The Diario de Navarra reported the runs of July 7, 9 and 10, 1906 as passing without serious incident: on July 7 a runner fell entering the ring but the bulls left him alone, the Saltillo run of July 9 gave only scares, and on July 10 the only incident was three bulls that stayed in the ring.^{4, 7, 9}

Who made the San Fermín 1906 poster?

Félix Lafuente made the San Fermín 1906 poster, signed on the poster itself: an elegant woman with a violin and bow, with round portraits of the musicians Sarasate, Gayarre, Eslava and Arrieta above her.^{13, 12}

Sources

Numbers on the page refer to this list. Diario de Navarra pages are cited from its archive (hemeroteca); quotations in Spanish are given as printed, in the spelling of the day.

Full source list

Diario de Navarra, July 6, 1906, page 3: “se han colocado ya los maderos para el vallado”; the Lizaso and Carriquiri bulls at the Sario. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 7, 1906, page 3: the Muruve bulls in the old gas works, and the pig. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 7, 1906, page 1: programme for July 7, the Carriquiri bulls leave the small corral of the Portal de Rochapea at six. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 9, 1906, page 1: the encierro of Saturday, July 7, and “El día de ayer”, Sunday, July 8. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 9, 1906, page 2: the paper’s account of the Palha bulls of July 8. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 9, 1906, page 1: programme for July 9, the Marqués del Saltillo bulls at six. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 10, 1906, page 1: the Lizaso bulls at three in the morning and the Saltillo encierro at six, July 9. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 10, 1906, page 1: the Muruve bulls, the fourth year the ranch sent bulls to Pamplona. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 11, 1906, page 1: “El encierro de los muruveños hízose sin novedad”; the fence taken down. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 14, 1906, page 2: a film shown in Pamplona, with the ring on July 7 during the encierro of the Espoz y Mina bulls. Diario de Navarra archive
Diario de Navarra, July 14, 1906, page 1: a column answering the writers Grandmontagne and Pinillos on the encierro. Diario de Navarra archive
Ricardo Ollaquindía, 100 años de carteles de las fiestas y ferias de San Fermín (1882 to 1981), Pamplona, 1981, chapter “1906”. Free copy in the Biblioteca Navarra Digital (BiNaDi). binadi.navarra.es
The poster of the Ferias y Fiestas de San Fermín 1906 itself, dated Pamplona, June 20, 1906, signed Félix Lafuente; printed by Lit. E. Portabella, Zaragoza.
Fototeca de Pamplona, Archivo Municipal de Pamplona (photographs of the encierro, free to view online; publication needs the archive’s permission). archivo.pamplona.es

How to cite this page

Encierro. “Running of the Bulls 1906: San Fermín in Pamplona.” Encierro.com, November 9, 2026. https://encierro.com/san-fermin-1906/

Corrections and updates

November 9, 2026: questions and answers rewritten around what people search, each answer with its sources; the poster labelled with its Spanish name, cartel.
November 8, 2026: page published.

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