Three of his brothers, Juan Luís, Antonio, and Miguel Ángel, also went into tauromachy, although they never rose above the level of novillero sin picadores.

At this event, he had himself announced as Pepito Martínez, and he shared billing with Mariano Martín "Carriles" and Manuel Gómez, fighting bulls laid on by the Antonio de la Cova ranch.

Given his lack of experience, though – he claimed in an interview decades later that by this time, he had never even tried his hand at a tentadero (a rural and somewhat less than professional-level bullfighting venue) – he chose to give this up for now and went back to being a novillero without picadores, even keeping his day job at a bar.

[1][3] Martínez began using the nickname Limeño at a local bullfight held on 22 August 1954 at the "La Pañoleta" bullring in Camas, just across the Guadalquivir from Seville.

An old banderillero from Seville named Emilio Boja "Panaderito" hit on the idea of adopting the late bullfighter José Gárate Hernández's nickname, "Limeño".

Furthermore, Gárate had never been one of bullfighting's great stars, and his performance was often lacklustre and his health was called into question (indeed, he died of angina at a young age).

Martínez had his presentation at Las Ventas in Madrid on 12 July 1959, alternating with fellow novilleros Adolfo Aparicio and José Álvarez, alongside whom he fought bulls supplied by the Don Higinio Luis Severino ranch.

[1] On the other hand, Martínez would gather up fourteen ears over the years at the bullring where he shone most outstandingly, Seville's Maestranza,[3] and would also be borne on shoulders out through the Prince's Gate four times – once in 1968, twice in 1969, and once in 1970 – which raised him to something of a bullfighting cult figure, especially as three of those trips through the gate were in recognition of having slain bulls from the Don Eduardo Miura ranch, which is known for breeding exceptional fighting bulls.

That landed him in the category of bullfighters known as gladiadores, who have proved themselves worthy of the distinction by fighting and slaying Spain's most difficult bulls.

[5] Martínez's four trips through the Prince's Gate yet stand as an unequalled feat, and unsurprisingly he enjoyed great prestige in Seville because of his successes in the bullring there.

Rounding out the bill that day were César Girón (who did rather badly with the afternoon's fourth bull) and the local José Luis Bernal, who had great difficulty with the two specimens that he drew at this corrida.

[10] The next year, on 20 April 1969, there was another resounding triumph for Martínez as he reaped four ears from the bulls that he fought that afternoon and was also borne out on shoulders through the Prince's Gate.

Fighting alongside him were Adolfo Rojas, a Venezuelan bullfighter from Maracay (who himself reaped one ear from the afternoon's sixth bull), and Andrés Hernando from La Velilla in the Province of Segovia[note 2] (who was applauded after having drawn the worst lot).

On 7 July that year, he appeared alongside Paquirri and Ángel Teruel as they faced bulls from the Antonio Martínez Elizondo ranch.

Martínez put forth a great effort all that afternoon, but he failed with the descabello (a downward thrust with a specially designed sword into a downed bull's neck, with the object of killing him quickly) with his first and ended up hearing the crowd's displeasure.

[9] Martínez, a respected man who was considered quite affable, did not altogether give up his links with tauromachy, but instead maintained them in other facets of the pursuit.

He was a businessman at the bullring at El Puerto de Santa María in the years 1987 and 1988, and until his death, he was a bullfighting inspector, reviewing bulls in a rural job that he carried out for the Casas company and about which he was enthusiastic.

Also paying respects at the ceremony were bull breeders (ganaderos) like the Miura Brothers and Álvaro Domecq, along with bullfighting businessmen like Simón Casas, Nacho Lloret, and Carmelo García.

[18] Despite the great number of people who came to Martínez's funeral, no funerary chapel was set up beforehand for mourners to pay their respects in the days leading up to the actual church service, and no procession bore his coffin shoulder-high for one last lap round the fighting ground inside the town's bullring.

Tall, elegant, he was the manly archetype of the unmistakable personality of a bullfighter and, after his retirement, he was recognized walking around Seville or his native Sanlúcar.

He always had the good manners of the bullfighters from the so-called Cádiz "corner", once an inexhaustible source of distinguished bullfighters such as Miguelín from Algeciras, Rafael Ortega in San Fernando, Mondeño from Puerto Real, and not to mention from Jerez, such as Rafael de Paula, Luis Parra Jerezano, and more recently, Francisco Ruiz Miguel, Julio Vega Marismeño, José Luis Parada, and Paco Ojeda.

(...) Limeño, like the previous holder of his nickname, that eternal companion of the beginnings of Joselito El Gallo, did not reach great numerical heights, but only the pride of those achievements in Seville will have been enough for him to feel satisfied with a more than respectable career.