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By using a comparative approach to examine the process and stakes of Muslim sacrifice in three different metropolitan contexts, this paper investigates the place held by animal ritual death in an urban area, based on ethnographic examples drawn from field studies during the ‘‘Feast of the Sacrifice’’ in 2014. The examples of Istanbul, Khartoum and Paris reflect perceptions, practices and management types that are both distinct and similar, with regard to a ritual event that is simultaneously associated with religious tradition and faced with profound transformations within urbanised, globalised societies. Whether this ritual sacrifice in cities is considered a kind of ritual normalcy (Khartoum), a practice deemed ‘‘out of place’’ (Paris), or even a practice that is both domesticated and controversial (Istanbul), its stakes are spatial and social, economic and political. It offers a special vantage point for observing plural, crossed representations of the place held by the animal (and by its death) in urban spaces.