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 Dances with short sticks are widespread in European folk traditions. Along with this dance included in the brokel-dantza cycle, Gipuzkoa can boast other examples of dances with short sticks in the trokeo-dantza of Antzuola, the Corpus Christi dances of Oñate and the carnival-tide dances of Lizartza, Abaltzisketa and Amezketa.
The earliest reference to this short-stick dance in the brokel-dantza cycle can be found in the 1824 work by Ignacio Iztueta, who refers to it as “Maquilla chiquiaquicoa” (dance of small sticks).
Juan Antonio Urbeltz has obtained a document which gives a detailed description of the dances performed in 1828 in honour of King Ferdinand VII and his wife Marie-Amelie of Saxony. The text describes the dances as if they were a dramatisation of a military engagement, and the author goes so far as to state that in one dance the performers launched arrows:
“… at which point they take up wooden darts (Gueciac) in their hands with which to do battle. The leader first dances a zorcico, indicating the steps to be performed and the use to be made of the weapons taken up. This lesson in dance having been imparted by the leader, the young warriors dance the zorcico in time with various steps, so that at last the music of the drummers sets a furious pace and all battle one with another with the darts, launching blows and defending themselves with concerted movements, thus presenting a fair simulation of an impasioned fight that at times even rends asunder the darts, though none of the dancers suffers injury”.
What the narrator refers to as “darts” could well have been short sticks or even small bows. (Ikus uztai txikiena - Historia)
The programme of entertainment for the dance festival staged in Bilbao by the brokel-dantza group trained by José Antonio Olano states as follows: "The Zorzico with numerous steps of stick beating, for which purpose each member of the group bears 2 short sticks”. José Antonio Azpiazu, in his publication Description of the public entertainments of Guipúzcoa and in particular of its dances, written that same year, described this dance as follows: small sticks. The rapid zorzico played and the blows handed out represent a skirmish by guerrillas striving to spur their enemy into more general action.
Thus in this variation and in those that follow the parts are repeated ever fast, and the blows are sped up likewise to signal that the fight is becoming fiercer and that such surges and charges are bringing it to its end.
The walk-out is likewise repeated and danced following this move and in all the intervals, suggesting that vigilance and precaution are never out of place if we are not to be surprised by the enemy, and that it is necessary therefore to reconnoitre his fields and positions before hostilities resume.
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