The Legend of the Black Madonna

So I honestly don’t know anything about Black Madonnas other than that I read that there are over 200 in France.  I assumed that these statues were simply an ethnically correct representation of the Virgin Mary- who probably had dark skin.

One of the oldest Black Madonnas is in Rocamadour, about 45 minutes outside of Sarlat. The village of Rocamadour looks like it was built into a limestone cliff with the Cathedral hanging over the edge.  During the 14^th Century, Rocamadour had 20,000 visitors a day and was one of Europe’s top pilgrimage sites.  There are 216 steps that lead up to the church and traditionally, a pilgrim would kneel on each step and pray an Ave Maria.

There are three levels to Rocamadour, the lowest level is this village and is made up of tourist shoppes, restaurants and a hotel. The middle is the “Cite Religieuse” with it’s seven chapels that awaited the pilgrams when they had done enough penance along the way to reach it.

Why the journey?  To view the thousand year old black Madonna located in the chapel of Notre-Dame.  France has over 200 black Madonnas and they don’t all seem to be of the Virgin Mary.  An art historian that we met thinks that many of the black Madonnas are actually of Mary Magdallen and that she is holding her child, fathered by Jesus.  Other folks think that the Virgin Mary was portrayed as black to encourage local, dark skinned pagans to convert to Christianity.  There is a pretty good chance that the entire ‘ holy family’ was not light skinned given their place of birth.

But to make things still more interesting, we learned about this town on the southern coast of France called Les Saintes-Maries-de-la Mer where there is also a black Madonna.  Every May 24-25, hundreds of gypsies from around the world make a pilgrimage to this fishing village and carry the statue from the church to the sea to be blessed.  The town is named after the Virgin Mary’s sister, Saint Marie-Jacobe and the mother of the apostles James & John, Saint Marie Salome who arrived there after the crucifixion.  Later, Mary Magdalen and Martha showed up and then left for Marsaille.   Saint Marie-Jacobe ( Virgin Mary’s mother) had a servant named Sara who became the patron saint of the gypsies and the Black Madonna carving in this church,  Notre-Dame-d-la-Mer is of the servant Sara.  So this begins my obsession with Black Madonnas and now we need to visit Marseille, where Mary Magdallen supposedly landed as well as Saintes-Maries-de-la Mer and who knows where this obsession may lead. [Ed. Even I am starting to get confused]

This little Black Madonna is coming home with us…

Rocamadour also has their own goat cheese which is sold all over France.   This cheese belongs to a family of goat cheeses called Cabecous.  It is creamy and delicious.  The cheese takes about 12 -15 days to attain full maturity and looks like a small hockey puck, but is soft like a brie.

Our last evening in Sarlat we had a lovely dinner at L’Adresse in old town: https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g196508-d3380528-Reviews-L_Adresse-Sarlat_la_Caneda_Dordogne_Aquitaine.html It is worth noting that this restaurant has seating in the front and in the back.  The front has a better view and is where the toilet is located, the back is kinda in an ally and so you have to walk around half a block if you need to visit the toilet.  Good food tho!