LOURDES, loord, Frince, town, in the de partment of Hautes-Pyrinees, on the Gave de Pau, about 85 miles southeast of Bayonne. It is situated where seven mountain passes lead to favorite resorts in the Pyrenees. Nearby are valuable marble and slate quarries. Formerly Lourdes was famed for its chocolate and its fortified castle, which was considered impreg nable in the days before the invention of fire arms. Lourdes was then called the ((key of the Pyrenees."' In the 18th century the castle was converted into a prison and became the Bastile of the Mountains. In the year 1858 Lourdes acquired new fame. A little peasant girl, about 14 years of age, named Marie-Bernarde Soubir ous (better known as ((Bernadette))) reported to her parents, on 11 Feb. 1858, that she had seen a most beautiful lady in a grotto at the rocks of Massabielle, a part of the town. The pastor of the Roman Catholic church at Lourdes, and the priests of the neighboring towns, also the bishop of Tarbes, the diocese in which Lourdes is located; all gave the matter no attention un til people from a distance began to visit Lourdes, and miracles were reported and scien tists had begun observations and investigations.
On 25 Feb. 1858 a spring appeared in a place where no water had been seen before. It was some days before the child gave a name to the lady; it was then Virgin Mary, under the name L'Immaculatee Conception. The matter was then investigated by the ecclesiastical authori ties and pronounced a genuine apparition and many cures were said to be miraculous. The place has become noted for the large number of visitors, fully 600,000 annually. A magnifi cent church, the Basilica of the Rosary, has been erected at the grotto, in which there is a great collection of votive offerings, and the flags of all nations show that pilgrims from the countries of the whole world have visited the place. The prosperity of the town is de pendent on the pilgrims. Pop. about 8.805.
Consult Benson, R. H., (London 1914) ; Bertrin, critique des evene ments de Lourdes' (2d ed., Paris 1905) ; Bois sake, (Lourdes histoire medicale) (ib. 1891); Estrade, J. B., of the Blessed Virgin Mary at the Grotto of Lourdes) (New York 1913) • Saint John, Blessed Virgin in the 19th Century' (1902); Zola, E.., (Paris 1894).