The Real Maestranza de Caballería de Ronda dedicates a new chapter of its Toreros Históricos series to Ángel Pastor, a 19th-century matador who took the alternativa in 1876 and who stood out both for his elegance in the ring and for his musical training.
The Real Maestranza de Caballería de Ronda has dedicated the fortieth installment of its Toreros Históricos series to Ángel Pastor, a 19th-century matador whose career the institution reviews based on bibliographic sources and the bullfighting publications of the time.
Pastor was born in Ocaña one year before the inauguration of the first Spanish railway line, in 1851. His family ran an inn and in 1853 moved to Aranjuez to open a guesthouse that soon became a meeting point for bullfighters and fans. According to the Real Maestranza, that atmosphere awakened the young man's vocation, who resisted higher studies and was placed as a typesetter in a Madrid printing house where the bullfighting posters were printed.
From banderillero to matador
He trained in the calf ring of the Campos Elíseos and by 1871 he was already part of the cuadrilla of Cayetano Sanz, his teacher. He took the alternativa on October 22, 1876, in a purple and silver suit, in a bullfight with Lagartijo, Frascuelo and Chicorro, and received the estoque and the muleta from the califa cordobés.
The Real Maestranza describes Pastor as a refined and artistic bullfighter, with poise and ease with the percales, but indecisive in the supreme luck, which spoiled many faenas. Even so, he always appeared on the best posters alongside Lagartijo and Frascuelo, who held him in high esteem. He suffered two serious gorings, one in Burgos in June 1878 and another on April 10, 1882, which sparked a wave of concern throughout society.
International career and retirement
He was the favorite bullfighter of the Parisian plaza built for the 1889 Universal Exposition, where he fought twenty-seven corridas. In 1891 he emerged unharmed from a railway accident in Quintanilleja and rescued the injured, an action for which he received the Cruz de Beneficencia. He continued bullfighting until 1893.
He retired to Aranjuez, where he cultivated reading and classical music. He spoke French fluently and played the piano, capable of performing pieces by Schubert. A year before his death he opened the Gran Hotel Pastor in the old palace of Godoy. He died on April 7, 1900, due to complications from a carriage accident that occurred on February 25, 1897, when he had not yet turned fifty.
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