PILGRIMAGES, journeys to distant places for devotional purposes. The custom of pilgrimage is ancient and, until modern times, was universal. In ancient Egypt and Syria were privileged temples to which devotees re sorted from distant parts. Pilgrimage is an im portant element in the religions of India. In the period of highest Grecian culture, whether in Greece itself or in Asia Minor or in Magna Grmcia, the chief temples of the Hellenic gods were the resort of pilgrims in thousands; the temple of Athene at her own city, that of Zeus at Olympus, that of lEsculapius at Epidaurus, of Hera at Samos, of Artemis at Ephesus, were for the Greeks what the temple at Jerusalem was for the is of Israel, or what Moham med's tomb s for the Moslems. eWe are only stirred,' says Cicero, Thy the very places that bear the footprints of those we love or admire.' The pilgrimages of the Jews to their holy city at the high festivals were matter of precept; in Christianity, though pilgrimages have never been commanded by the Church, the custom of pilgrimage has had a vast development, begin ning in the first Christian Age, and certainly attaining considerable proportions in the century which saw the triumph of the new religion over Roman paganism. Among the works of Saint Jerome (340-420) occur letters of his correspondents in Syria, the ladies Paula and Eustochium, in one of which the resort of numerous pilgrims to the holy places in Pales tine is recorded in terms which give proof that in that day pilgrimage was a highly esteemed form of devotion, though the historical ac curacy of the statement that pilgrims had flocked to the scenes of Christ's life since the ascension' is open to question. cIt were irksome,' the lady Paula writes, count the bishops, the martyrs, the masters of ecclesias tical learning, who from the Lord's ascension till this day have come to Jerusalem, thinking that they would have less devotion, less knowl edge; that their virtues would lack their last perfection, unless they should have worshipped Christ at the very spot where first the gospel light beamed forth from the gibbet' We learn from Saint Augustine and some of his contem poraries that the tomb of the protomartyr, Saint Stephen, attracted in his time great throngs of pilgrims. But it was in the Middle
Ages that pilgrimage had greatest vogue. For some time after the Saracens .had become mas ters of Palestine the pilgrims from the West had unhindered access to the holy places; but when Jerusalem came under the control of the fanatical sect of the Fatimites, Christian dev otees were made the victims of all forms of outrage. After enduring this for about two centuries the Western world poured out its hosts of armed pilgrims, the Crusaders. But Palestine did not comprise all the places of pilgrim resort : near the city of Rome is Loreto, believed to contain the very house in which Jesus and his mother lived; Spain had 'the shrine of Saint James (Santiago) de Compostella; France that of Saint Martin of Tours. In the year 1428 there sailed from nine different ports of England for Spain on the way to Compostella 866 pilgrims; at the same time there were several famous shrines in England itself, chief among them the shrine of Saint Thomas a Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, one of the most celebrated resorts of pilgrims. In the latter half of the 19th century there was a revival of the custom of pilgrimages, especially in France. The most persistent pilgrimages of modern times are those of Islamites to Mecca (q.v.) and Medina (q.v.). These two Arabian cities live almost wholly off the pilgrims who come in vast numbers. Mecca is the sacred city, but the bones of the Prophet lie in a mosque at Medina, so thousands of the faith ful deem it incumbent on them to visit both cities.