PILGRIM pellegrino, Lat. peregrinus, visitor of foreign lands"). A pilgrim is one who visits, with religious intent, some place reputed to possess especial holiness. The early Christians, like the Jews and the pagan Gentiles, regarded certain places with special religious interest; above all, the Holy Land, and particularly the scenes of the passion of our Lord at Jerusalem. St. Jerom (Ep. xliv.) refers the practice of visiting Jerusalem to the discovery of the holy cross by St. Helena. lie himself was a zealous pilgrim; and throughout the 4th, 5th, and 6th c., pilgrims habitually undertook the long and perilous journey to the Holy Land from almost every part of the west. Other sacred places. too, were held to he fit objects of the same visits of religious veneration. The tombs of the apostles Peter and Paul, and of the martyrs in the catacombs at Rome, are so described by St. Jerome (Commentar. in Ezekiel). St. Basil speaks in the same tdrms of the tomb of the forty martyrs; and the historian Thedoret tells of not only visit ing such sanctinuies, but of hanging up therein, as offerings, gold and silver ornaments, and even !ROWS of hands, feet, eyes, etc., in commemoration of the cures of diseases supernaturally obtained as the fruitth f 0- these pious visits. The PILGRIMAGE. however, pre-eminently so called, was that of the Holy Land; and even after Jerusalem had been occupied by the Saracens, the liberty of pilgrimage, on payment of a tax, was formally secured by treaty; and it was from the necessity of protecting pilgrims from outrage that the well-known military orders (q.v.) had their origin. The crusades (q.v.) may be regarded as a pilgrimage on a great scale; the direct object being to secure _for the Latin Christians immunity of pilgrimage. On the other hand, the final abandonment of the crusades led to a great extension of what may be called domestic pilgrimage, and drew into religious notice and veneration luau shrines in Europe, which, after the lapse of time, became celebrated places of pious resort. The chief places of pilgrimage in the west
were: in ltaly—Rome, Loretto (q.v.), Genetsano, Assisi; in Spain—Compostella, Guada lupe, Montserrat; in Fraace—Fourvieres, Puy, St. Denis; in Germany—Oetting, Zell, Cologne, Trier. Einsiedeln; in England—Walsingliam, Canterbury, and many others of minor note. The pilgrim commonly bound himself only by a temporary vow (differing in this from the pahner), which terminated with the actual vlsit to the place of pilgrimage, or at least with the return home, and by which lie was humid for the time to chastity and to certain other_ascetic observances. The costume consisted of a black or gray gabardine girt whh a cincture. from which a shell and scripAvere su-pended, a broad hat, orna mented with scallop-shells, and a long staff. Many abuses arose out of these pilgrimages, the popular notions regarding which may he gathered—although; probably, with a dash of caricature—from Chanter's Canterbury Tales. Pilgrimages, which have always sub sisted in Italy. Spain, southern Germany, and Switzerland, had gone much into disuse in France during and since the revolution. In late years, however, pilgrims have resorted in large numbers, not only to the ancient sanctuaries of Notre Dame de In Garde, de Four vicres, de Puy, etc., hut also to La Salette, Lourdes, Paray-le-Monial, and Pontigny. In 1873 and 1874 organized parties of pilgrims on a very large scale from France, Belgium, England, the United States, etc., visited the sanetuary,of Paray-le-Monial, the place at which the vision of Marie Alacoque, which gave rise to the devotion to the sacred heart of .7esus (q.v.) is recorded to have taken place. In 1874, 500 English pilgrims visited Pontigny. Numerous pilgrimages have also been held in Belgium.