{"id":11428,"date":"2026-07-08T20:49:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T20:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/guadalupe-history-of-the-apparitions"},"modified":"2026-07-08T20:49:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T20:49:11","slug":"guadalupe-history-of-the-apparitions","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/guadalupe-history-of-the-apparitions","title":{"rendered":"The Complete History of Guadalupe \u2014 A Chronology"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"rr-om\">\n<style>\n.rr-om{max-width:880px;margin:0 auto;font-family:Inter,system-ui,sans-serif;color:#1E2A36}\n.rr-om h1{font-family:Merriweather,Georgia,serif;color:#1F4E79;text-align:center;font-size:2.1rem;margin:.4rem 0 .2rem}\n.rr-om .rr-sub{text-align:center;color:#8A6D1D;font-family:Merriweather,Georgia,serif;font-style:italic;font-size:1.15rem;margin:0 0 1.2rem}\n.rr-om .rr-lead{color:#344054;line-height:1.75;max-width:720px;margin:0 auto 1.2rem}\n.rr-om h2{font-family:Merriweather,Georgia,serif;color:#1F4E79;font-size:1.45rem;border-bottom:2px solid #C9A227;padding-bottom:.35rem;margin:2.2rem 0 .9rem}\n.rr-om h3{font-family:Merriweather,Georgia,serif;color:#1F4E79;font-size:1.1rem;margin:1.4rem 0 .5rem}\n.rr-om p{color:#344054;line-height:1.75}\n.rr-om .rr-crono{border-left:3px solid #C9A227;margin:1rem 0 1rem .4rem;padding-left:1.2rem}\n.rr-om .rr-hito{margin:0 0 1.1rem}\n.rr-om .rr-hito b{color:#1F4E79;display:block;font-family:Merriweather,Georgia,serif}\n.rr-om .rr-datos{display:grid;grid-template-columns:repeat(auto-fit,minmax(240px,1fr));gap:10px;margin:.6rem 0}\n.rr-om .rr-dato{background:#F8F5EF;border:1px solid #E6E1D8;border-radius:10px;padding:.6rem .9rem;font-size:.95rem}\n.rr-om .rr-dato b{color:#1F4E79}\n.rr-om .rr-flor{background:linear-gradient(135deg,#1F4E79,#183B5C);border-radius:16px;padding:1.6rem 1.4rem;color:#fff;margin:2rem 0;text-align:center;border:1px solid #C9A22755}\n.rr-om .rr-flor h3{color:#F3E7BD;margin-top:0}\n.rr-om .rr-flor p{color:#E8EDF3}\n.rr-om .rr-flor a{display:inline-block;background:#C9A227;color:#1E2A36;border-radius:999px;padding:.7rem 1.5rem;text-decoration:none;font-weight:700;margin-top:.6rem}\n.rr-om .rr-btns{display:flex;flex-wrap:wrap;gap:10px;justify-content:center;margin:1.6rem 0}\n.rr-om .rr-btn{background:#1F4E79;color:#fff;border-radius:999px;padding:.6rem 1.2rem;text-decoration:none;font-weight:600;font-size:.92rem}\n.rr-om .rr-btn:hover{background:#183B5C;color:#F3E7BD}\n.rr-om .rr-fuentes{font-size:.88rem;color:#667085;border-top:1px solid #E6E1D8;padding-top:1rem;margin-top:2rem}\n@media(max-width:560px){.rr-om h1{font-size:1.7rem}}\n<\/style>\n\n<h1>The Complete History of Guadalupe \u2014 A Chronology<\/h1>\n<p class=\"rr-sub\">From the hill of Tepeyac to the most visited Marian shrine in the world<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"rr-lead\">Between <strong>9 and 12 December 1531<\/strong>, barely ten years after the fall of Tenochtitlan, the Virgin Mary appeared <strong>four times<\/strong> to <strong>Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin<\/strong>, a poor Indian, on the hill of <strong>Tepeyac<\/strong>, north of Mexico City. From those encounters \u2014and from a cloak of maguey fibre on which the image of the Lady was imprinted\u2014 was born the greatest miracle of the Americas and a devotion that has shaped the history of an entire continent.<\/p>\n\n<h2>Key facts<\/h2>\n<div class=\"rr-datos\">\n<div class=\"rr-dato\"><b>Place:<\/b> Hill of Tepeyac, Mexico City<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-dato\"><b>Seer:<\/b> Saint Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin (c. 1474-1548)<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-dato\"><b>Apparitions:<\/b> 4, from 9 to 12 December 1531<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-dato\"><b>Feast day:<\/b> 12 December<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<h2>Chronology of the apparitions (1531)<\/h2>\n<div class=\"rr-crono\">\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>Saturday 9 December<\/b>First apparition. At dawn, Juan Diego is crossing Tepeyac on his way to Tlatelolco when he hears birdsong and a voice calling him by name with tenderness: \u00abJuanito, Juan Dieguito.\u00bb At the top of the hill he sees a Lady whose garment shines like the sun, who presents herself as \u00abthe perfect ever-Virgin Mary, Mother of the true God\u00bb and asks that a temple be raised on that plain: \u00abHere I will show him and exalt him in making him manifest; I will give him to the people in all my personal love.\u00bb<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>9 December, in the evening<\/b>Second apparition. The bishop-elect, Fray <strong>Juan de Zum\u00e1rraga<\/strong>, has listened to Juan Diego with courtesy, but has not believed him. On his way back, Juan Diego begs the Virgin to send \u00abone of the nobles, someone known, respected and esteemed,\u00bb because he is \u00aba man of the fields, a rope, a small wooden ladder.\u00bb The Lady replies that she has many messengers, but that it is he whom she wants, and she asks that it be he who represents her.<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>Sunday 10 December<\/b>Third apparition. Zum\u00e1rraga, more attentive at the second audience, asks for a sign. The Virgin promises to give it the next day. But on arriving home, Juan Diego finds his uncle <strong>Juan Bernardino<\/strong> gravely ill.<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>Tuesday 12 December, at dawn<\/b>Fourth apparition. Juan Diego goes around the hill so as not to meet the Lady: he is going to fetch a priest to hear the confession of his dying uncle. She comes out to meet him and speaks the words that all Mexico knows by heart: <em>\u00abAm I not here, I who am your mother? Are you not under my shadow? Am I not your health?\u00bb<\/em> She assures him that his uncle has already been healed, and sends him up to the summit to cut flowers.<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>12 December, the sign<\/b>In the depths of winter, on a hill of thorns and scrub, Juan Diego finds fresh, fragrant <strong>Castilian roses<\/strong>. The Lady arranges them with her own hands in the Indian&#8217;s cloak and orders him not to open it until he stands before the bishop.<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>12 December, before Zum\u00e1rraga<\/b>When Juan Diego unfolds his tilma, the flowers fall to the ground and there appears, <strong>imprinted on the cloth, the image of the Virgin<\/strong>, dark-skinned and with her hands joined, just as she is venerated today. The bishop kneels down weeping and asks forgiveness. Soon afterwards, the building of the first hermitage of Tepeyac begins.<\/div>\n<div class=\"rr-hito\"><b>12 December, at the house of Juan Bernardino<\/b>The uncle has been healed at the exact hour the Lady announced it. According to the tradition gathered in the Guadalupan sources, the Virgin also appeared to him and revealed her name to him: <strong>Holy Mary of Guadalupe<\/strong>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<h2>The tilma: a cloth that was not meant to last<\/h2>\n<p>The image was imprinted on an <strong>ayate of maguey fibre<\/strong>, a humble cloth whose normal useful life is estimated at a few decades. And yet the tilma \u2014about 1.7 metres tall\u2014 has been preserved for <strong>almost five centuries<\/strong>, exposed for generations without protection to the smoke of candles, the touch of the faithful and the humidity of the old lake. In the early years it hung in the primitive hermitage; today it presides over the modern basilica, before which millions of pilgrims pass every year.<\/p>\n\n<h2>The Nican Mopohua<\/h2>\n<p>The classic account of the apparitions is the <strong>Nican Mopohua<\/strong> (\u00abHere it is told\u00bb), written in the Nahuatl language with extraordinary literary delicacy and traditionally attributed to the Indian scholar <strong>Antonio Valeriano<\/strong> (16th century); it was published in 1649 by <strong>Luis Lasso de la Vega<\/strong>. From it come the dialogues between the Virgin and Juan Diego quoted on this page, a jewel of the Marian literature of the world.<\/p>\n\n<h2>Recognition by the Church<\/h2>\n<p>Guadalupan devotion grew without pause from the 16th century onwards, and the Church confirmed it solemnly: in <strong>1737<\/strong>, after the great epidemic, Our Lady of Guadalupe was sworn <strong>patroness of Mexico City<\/strong> and then of all New Spain; in <strong>1754<\/strong> Pope <strong>Benedict XIV<\/strong> approved the patronage and granted a proper Mass and Office for 12 December \u2014to him is attributed the exclamation from the psalm: <em>\u00abNon fecit taliter omni nationi,\u00bb<\/em> \u00abHe has not done the like for any other nation\u00bb\u2014; the image was <strong>canonically crowned on 12 October 1895<\/strong>; Saint <strong>Pius X<\/strong> declared her <strong>patroness of Latin America<\/strong> in 1910, and <strong>Pius XII<\/strong> called her \u00abEmpress of the Americas\u00bb in 1945.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Juan Diego<\/strong> was beatified in 1990 and <strong>canonised on 31 July 2002<\/strong> by Saint John Paul II in the basilica of Guadalupe itself: the first indigenous saint of the Americas. His feast is kept on 9 December.<\/p>\n\n<h2>The shrine and the devotion<\/h2>\n<p>On Tepeyac, hermitages and ever greater churches followed one another: the 16th-century church, the great baroque shrine consecrated in <strong>1709<\/strong> (today&#8217;s Old Basilica) and, since <strong>1976<\/strong>, the <strong>new Basilica of Saint Mary of Guadalupe<\/strong>, circular in plan, where the tilma is venerated raised above the altar. The Tepeyac complex is today the <strong>most visited Marian shrine in the world<\/strong>: every 12 December, millions of pilgrims arrive on foot, singing the ma\u00f1anitas, carrying images on their backs, and all year round there flows a constant river of faithful from the whole continent.<\/p>\n\n<h2>Guadalupe and the Rosary<\/h2>\n<p>Guadalupan devotion and the Rosary have walked together from the beginning: pilgrimages to Tepeyac are prayed rosary in hand, and the dialogues of the Nican Mopohua \u2014the tenderness of the Mother, her shadow and her lap\u2014 are inexhaustible matter for Marian meditation. On this site you can pray the <a href=\"\/en\/oraciones-y-novenas-marianas\/rosario-nuestra-senora-de-guadalupe-texto\/\">Rosary of Our Lady of Guadalupe with meditations from the Nican Mopohua<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n<h2>Stories that surprise<\/h2>\n<h3>The bomb of 1921<\/h3>\n<p>On 14 November 1921, at the height of the religious persecution, a man placed before the altar a bouquet of flowers concealing a <strong>dynamite bomb<\/strong>. The explosion shattered the altar steps, the candlesticks and the windows of much of the church, and bent a brass crucifix that is shown to pilgrims to this day as a witness. The tilma, a few metres away, remained <strong>intact<\/strong>; not even the glass protecting it was cracked.<\/p>\n<h3>The bishop who asked for a sign<\/h3>\n<p>Fray Juan de Zum\u00e1rraga, a prudent Franciscan, went down in history for not believing at first. His demand for proof \u2014so very human\u2014 is an essential part of the story: thanks to it there exist the roses of December and the image on the tilma. Tradition tells that, on seeing the image, he begged forgiveness on his knees for his unbelief and took the tilma to his oratory before moving it to Tepeyac.<\/p>\n\n<div class=\"rr-flor\">\n<h3>\ud83c\udf39 A flower for the Virgin<\/h3>\n<p>Pray a Hail Mary for Mexico and for all her children.<\/p>\n<a href=\"\/hr\/marian-prayers\/\">Pray a Hail Mary<\/a>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"rr-btns\">\n<a class=\"rr-btn\" href=\"\/hr\/our-lady-of-guadalupe\/\">\ud83c\udf39 Our Lady of Guadalupe<\/a>\n<a class=\"rr-btn\" href=\"\/en\/santuarios-marianos-indice\/santuario-guadalupe-dossier-completo\/\">\ud83d\udcd6 Shrine dossier<\/a>\n<a class=\"rr-btn\" href=\"\/en\/oraciones-y-novenas-marianas\/rosario-nuestra-senora-de-guadalupe-texto\/\">\ud83d\udcff Guadalupe Rosary<\/a>\n<a class=\"rr-btn\" href=\"\/hr\/marian-prayers\/\">\ud83d\ude4f Marian prayers<\/a>\n<a class=\"rr-btn\" href=\"\/en\/anecdotas-marianas\/\">\ud83d\udcd6 Marian stories<\/a>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"rr-fuentes\">\n<strong>Sources:<\/strong> the Nican Mopohua (classic translations), the tradition of the shrine of Tepeyac, the pontifical documents cited (Benedict XIV 1754, coronation 1895, Pius X 1910, Pius XII 1945, canonisation 2002) and general Guadalupan bibliography. Extraordinary accounts are presented as devotion and as the historical memory of the shrine, not as doctrinal pronouncement.\n<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Complete History of Guadalupe \u2014 A Chronology From the hill of Tepeyac to the most visited Marian shrine in the world Between 9 and 12 December 1531, barely ten years after the fall of Tenochtitlan, the Virgin Mary appeared four times to Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin, a poor Indian, on the hill of Tepeyac, north [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"slim_seo":{"title":"The Complete History of Guadalupe \u2014 A Chronology - Reza el Rosario","description":"The Complete History of Guadalupe \u2014 A Chronology From the hill of Tepeyac to the most visited Marian shrine in the world Between 9 and 12 December 1531 , barely"},"rra_otros_nombres":"","rra_descripcion_corta":"","rra_historia":"","rra_imagen_principal":"","rra_galeria":"","rra_origen_principal":"","rra_origen_secundario":"","rra_pais":"","rra_region":"","rra_provincia":"","rra_ciudad":"","rra_parroquia":"","rra_santuario":"","rra_coordenadas":"","rra_fecha_origen":"","rra_fecha_fiesta":"","rra_vidente":"","rra_patronazgo":"","rra_espiritualidad":"","rra_relacion_con_rosario":"","rra_oracion":"","rra_novena":"","rra_himno":"","rra_fuentes":"","rra_estado_revision":"","rra_destacada":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-11428","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/11428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/11428\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rezaelrosario.org\/hr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}