Pan de ánimas

Today, the pan de ánimas has some derivatives, recipes that have been converted into sweet breads, typical of All Saints Day, such as the fogassa from Valencia or the panellets from Catalonia.

In ancient times, the reasons why the bread dough doubled in size were unknown and the phenomenon was allegorically associated with the gestation of a new life.

"[7] Jean-François Peyron and many others European travelers who went to Spain between the fifteenth and eighteenth centuries highlight the Spanish fervor for the cult of death.

[8] The votive character of bread reaches its maximum expression during the festa di San Giuseppe in Sicily,[9] at that time a Hispanic region, where loaves are placed on altars on March 19.

[11] Currently, bread has lost the sacred and relevant character that it has historically had, and consequently the cultural practices associated with it, such as pan de ánimas, have been disappearing.

The author Ibán Yarza [es], who toured the 50 Spanish provinces to study their local baking tradition, comments that "bread has been discredited or, rather, it has been desecrated in the sense that it was sacred because it was what was eaten the most.

"[12] As recorded in texts (already in the 16th century), in the Iberian Peninsula it was typical to make an annual visit to the cemetery and place bread, wine and flowers on the graves.

[22] In studies by Portuguese ethnographers such as that of Leite de Vasconcelos, the continuity of these bread offerings in the regions of Portugal is evidenced, without any variation with those of Spain.

The castañadas as "funerary food" are typical of the Leonese region, Asturias, Cantabria and Galicia, and even of Valladolid, Ávila and Extremadura.

[21] According to Hoyos Sainz, on the Cantabrian Mountains, bread and other foods were placed on the tombs of the dead on All Saints' night, which today has been replaced by flowers.

Even in the past, in public ovens there was a cabinet called animer, in which all the bread was placed, which the women later gave to the souls of the deceased.

Another Catalan mortuary bread is called pa de memòria, a loaf with a cross in the middle that was distributed to those attending a funeral after eating together.

[7][25] Once in the Balearic Islands, panets de mort were made for Tots Sants, tiny breads with anthropomorphic (dead person) or zoomorphic (rabbit) form.

These buns were spun on a string in the shape of a rosary and given to the children of the house to teach them the custom of praying and mourning the death of their deceased on November 1.