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The Vaca das Cordas ("Cow of the Ropes") festival that takes place in early June is one of Iberia's many bovine-related traditions dating from pre-Christian times with origins in ancient Egyptian cults brought to the Iberian peninsula by the Phoenicians. According to Egyptian mythology, Jupiter kidnapped his beloved Io and when repelled by her mother, he turned her into a cow and commanded a bumblebee to repeatedly sting her. As a result, Io fled to Egypt where she regained her human form and married the god Osiris. The Egyptians then erected altars to Isis in her honor in the image of a cow, a symbol that became a goddess of fertility in Egypt and later in Portugal. It is believed that Ponte de Lima's parish church was built over such a temple, when the town's Christian citizens, in order to show their renunciation of idols, dragged their old bovine image around town until it broke into pieces. Since then, a live bull has been used. In the annual festival, a bull tied by the horns is lead three times around the church as it's jabbed with goads in reference to the mythical bee. Following this, mimicking Io's flight to Egypt, the animal charges through the town's streets before ending up at the beach. On the following day, there is a serene Christian procession, when the streets are covered with flowers.