Spain’s Top Matador Left the Ring Torn Open

José Antonio Morante Camacho, better known as Morante de la Puebla, returned to Seville’s La Maestranza expecting applause, reverence, and another chapter in the mythology of Spanish bullfighting. Instead, he left with a horn up the arse, a perforated rectum, and a brutal reminder that if you build your career tormenting terrified animals in front of a crowd, sometimes the ending writes itself.

During the April Fair on the 20th of April, Morante was facing the fourth bull of the afternoon, an animal named Clandestino, when things stopped going to plan. Reports say the bull charged him, knocked him down, and drove a horn into his backside as he lay on the sand. Doctors later confirmed a wound of around 10cm, damage to the anal sphincter muscles, and a 1.5cm perforation in the rectal wall. He underwent emergency surgery lasting around two hours.

It is difficult to imagine a better summary of bullfighting than that. A man dressed up as a cultural icon enters an arena to dominate, exhaust, and kill an animal for entertainment, then ends the day being rushed to hospital because the victim fought back. The “king of the bullfighters” was reduced to clutching his torn trousers while being carried out of the ring by other matadors.

Morante later said it was the most painful goring he had ever suffered. He reportedly could not eat or sleep properly afterwards and required a catheter while recovering in hospital. There is an obvious joke here about finally understanding what it means to be on the receiving end of something sharp and unwanted, but the real point is simpler. Bullfighting is not noble, artistic, or brave. It is a blood spectacle built around ritualised animal abuse, dressed up in embroidery and ego.

Around 1,500 bullfights are still held in Spain every year, though support has declined as more people recognise the obvious. Bulls are living beings deliberately stressed, injured, and killed for an audience that has confused cruelty with tradition.

So yes, Morante’s comeback has attracted headlines. But only because one of the bulls decided that if somebody was going to get ripped open in Seville, it did not have to be the usual victim.

Bullfighting belongs in the past, alongside Morante’s dignity.