**The whale** ::ballena 
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The area known as Labatai, located beside one of Deba’s old town gates, was for centuries a key hub of the local whaling industry. Its name —from the Basque words labea (oven) and atea (gate)— recalls the ovens where whale blubber was melted down. Here, in a spot once washed by the tide, whales brought to shore were cut up, and their fat was boiled in large copper cauldrons to produce saín (oil), a highly valued substance that burned cleanly, gave off good light, and produced almost no smoke or odor.
Whaling played a decisive role in the economic and social development of Deba and its surroundings. After the lookout on Santa Catalina signaled a sighting, small whaleboats set out from the port in pursuit of the Basque right whale, while townspeople gathered on the cliffs to cheer on the crews. The first harpooner received special rewards, and once the whale was towed ashore, every part of it was used: blubber for oil, meat salted and exported to France, the prized tongue reserved for nobility and the Church, and bones and baleen used in corsetry, decorative objects, furniture and even construction.
From the 15th century onward, as whales disappeared from the Bay of Biscay, Deba’s whalers were forced to sail increasingly farther: first to the coasts of Asturias, Galicia and Iceland, and eventually to Newfoundland and Labrador. Deba became an important whaling port, receiving oil from local expeditions as well as from ships belonging to other Gipuzkoan ports. From Deba and the nearby river port of Alzola, these products traveled inland toward Álava and the Castilian Plateau, making the town a crucial crossroads in the Basque maritime economy.
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