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Mattanza, [1] [2] literally 'slaughter' or 'killing' in Italian, also known as Almadraba in Spanish and Almadrava in Portuguese, is a traditional tuna fishing technique that uses a series of large nets to trap and exhaust the fish.
There are mattanza traditions linked to Trapani in Sicily, the Egadi island of Favignana, and Carloforte and the Isola di San Pietro in southwestern Sardinia, as well as locations in Spain, Portugal, Morocco, and Tunisia.
The practice of Mattanza is an elaborate and age-old fishing technique for trapping and catching Atlantic bluefin tuna that can be traced back to the Phoenicians.
While it is unclear how the technique was spread around the Mediterranean basin, it was also imparted to areas such as Iberia during Iberia's Islamic period. [3]
The Spanish derive the term Almadraba (Portuguese : Almadrava) from the Andalusi Arabic word al-maḍraba (المضربة), meaning 'a place to strike' (Arabic root: ḍaraba (ضرب), meaning 'it struck, hit'). [3] The introduction in Sicily and Sardinia, but not mainland Italy, is also either attributed to the Moors, during Sicily's own Islamic period or by the Spanish afterwards.
From March the tuna schools migrate through the Strait of Gibraltar into the Mediterranean to visit their spawning grounds.
From May onwards, fishermen drive schools of fish in straits into a system of nets (known in Italian as tonnara [4] ), that form various chambers. The tuna are guided through the chambers, which are being drawn closer and closer together, to the inner chamber (southern Italian: càmira dâ morti, literally "death chamber"), from which they are then lifted onto the fishing boats with grappling hooks. The tuna caught is processed on land directly in the tonnara (from tonno, meaning "tuna"). [5]
Traditional Italian locations for the mattanza include Trapani, Favignana, Capo Passero, Formica, Bonagia, Scopello, Castellammare del Golfo, San Vito Lo Capo, Portopalo and Capo Granitola and in the Sardinian locals of Sant'Antioco and Carloforte. There are other locations in Andalusia, Murcia and Valencia in Spain, Algarve in Portugal, Sidi Daoud in Tunisia and in Morocco. [6] [7]
The bycatch contains, among others, bullet tuna (Auxis rochei), little tunny (Euthynnus alletteratus), Atlantic bonito (Sarda sarda), bigeye tuna (Thunnus obesus) and swordfish (Xiphias gladius). However, the Atlantic bluefin tuna yields of the mattanza are constantly falling due to the overfishing of the stocks, so that the mattanza is more of a tourist event today.
In Italy, in 2003 and 2004, it could no longer take place in Trapani. The schools of tuna had already been fully fished beforehand by international fishing fleets long before they approach coastal areas were they can be caught with the mattanza traps. The last slaughter in Sicily took place in the Favignana trap in 2007. In 2015, only one slaughter took place in Sardinia, between Portoscuso and Carloforte. The Ministry of Agricultural, Food and Forestry Policies still authorizes six fixed traps in Italy every year: Flat island and Cala Vinagra (Carloforte), Capo Altano and Porto Paglia (Portoscuso), Favignana, Camogli.
Sardinia is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, and one of the twenty regions of Italy. It is located west of the Italian Peninsula, north of Tunisia and 16.45 km south of the French island of Corsica.
Trapani is a city and municipality (comune) on the west coast of Sicily, in Italy. It is the capital of the Province of Trapani. Founded by Elymians, the city is still an important fishing port and the main gateway to the nearby Egadi Islands.
A tuna is a saltwater fish that belongs to the tribe Thunnini, a subgrouping of the Scombridae (mackerel) family. The Thunnini comprise 17 species across five genera, the sizes of which vary greatly, ranging from the bullet tuna up to the Atlantic bluefin tuna, which averages 2 m (6.6 ft) and is believed to live up to 50 years.
The Atlantic bluefin tuna is a species of tuna in the family Scombridae. It is variously known as the northern bluefin tuna, giant bluefin tuna, and formerly as the tunny.
The province of Trapani is a province in the autonomous island region of Sicily, Italy. Following the suppression of the Sicilian provinces, it was replaced in 2015 by the free municipal consortium of Trapani. Its capital is the city of Trapani. It has an area of 2,469.62 square kilometres (953.53 sq mi) and a total population of 433,826 (2017). There are 25 comuni in the province.
Sant'Antioco is the name of both an island and a municipality (comune) in southwestern Sardinia, in the Province of South Sardinia, in Sulcis zone. With a population of 11,730, the municipality of Sant'Antioco it is the island's largest community. It is also the site of ancient Sulci, considered the second city of Sardinia in antiquity.
Carloforte is a fishing and resort town located on Isola di San Pietro, approximately 7 kilometres off the southwestern coast of Sardinia, in the Province of South Sardinia, Italy. It is one of I Borghi più belli d'Italia.
Castellammare del Golfo is a town and municipality in the Trapani Province of Sicily. The name can be translated as "Sea Fortress on the Gulf", stemming from the medieval fortress in the harbor. The nearby body of water conversely takes its name from the town, and is known as Gulf of Castellammare.
The Florio family was a prominent entrepreneurial Italian family who started many lucrative activities in Sicily involving the export of Sicilian products in the 19th century, in some ways redeeming Sicily from feudal immobility. The family extended its interests to shipping, shipbuilding, fisheries, mining, metallurgy and ceramics. The Florio economic dynasty was one of the wealthiest Italian families during the late 19th century. In the heyday of the Florio business empire reportedly some 16,000 people depended on the family, and the press sometimes referred to Palermo as 'Floriopolis'.
Almadraba is an elaborate and ancient technique for trapping and catching Atlantic bluefin tuna.
Favignana is a comune including three islands of the Aegadian Islands, southern Italy. It is situated approximately 18 kilometres west of the coast of Sicily, between Trapani and Marsala, the coastal area where the Stagnone Lagoon and the international airport of Trapani, are sited.
Marettimo is one of the Aegadian Islands in the Mediterranean Sea west of Sicily, Italy. It forms a part of the municipality (comune) of Favignana in the Province of Trapani. It takes about an hour to reach the island from Trapani.
The Atlantic bonito is a large mackerel-like fish of the family Scombridae. It is common in shallow waters of the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Black Sea, where it is an important commercial and game fish.
Pachino is a town and comune in the Province of Syracuse, Sicily (Italy). The name derives from the Latin word bacchus, which is the Roman god of wine, and the word vinum, which means wine in Latin; originally the town was named Bachino which eventually was changed to Pachino when, in Sicily, Italian became the official spoken and written language.
Isola delle Femmine is an Italian town in northwestern Sicily, administratively part of the Metropolitan City of Palermo.
San Pietro Island is an island approximately seven kilometres off the South western Coast of Sardinia, Italy, facing the Sulcis peninsula. With an area of 51 square kilometres it is the sixth-largest island of Italy by area. The approximately 6,000 inhabitants are mostly concentrated in the fishing town of Carloforte, the only comune in the island. It is included in the province of South Sardinia. It is named after Saint Peter.
Mondello is a small borough of the city of Palermo in the autonomous region of Sicily in Southern Italy.
The gulf of Castellammare is a large and deep natural inlet going from Capo Rama and Capo San Vito near San Vito Lo Capo, in the province of Trapani. It is located on the western coast of Sicily and it faces the Tyrrhenian Sea.
The port of Isla Cristina, belonging to the maritime province of Huelva on the Spanish Costa de la Luz, is the port with the highest turnover in fresh fish in Andalusia and one of the first in tonnage and importance of catches at national level. It is one of the 23 main fishing ports in Spain designated by the FAO. It exports its products to all of Spain and much of Europe. It was originally developed as a way to support the fishing activity of the first settlers in the area in the 18th century. It has grown steadily in extension, reaching over 640,000 m² in 2009 after its latest expansion, although not in terms of the landing of catches. The 1920s marked the highest number of fish landed with almost 16,000 tons in a single year, highlighting the tuna almadraba. As a sardine port it has been, for decades, one of the first in Spain and the traditional species of the port.
The Tonnara of Favignana, officially known as the Ex Stabilimento Florio delle tonnare di Favignana e Formica, is a historic tuna fishery located on the island of Favignana, which is part of the Aegadian Islands off the west coast of Sicily, Italy.