Lourdes entdecken

The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes is a Catholic pilgrimage site of 52 hectares around the grotto of Massabielle, where Bernadette Soubirous reported 18 apparitions of the Virgin Mary in 1858. It includes three basilicas, the grotto with its spring, baths, a large esplanade used for processions and a Stations of the Cross on the hillside.

The Rosary Basilica is the lower of the three basilicas of the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes, built in a Romano-Byzantine style to plans by Léopold Hardy from 1883 and consecrated in 1901. Its round nave under a dome is ringed by 15 side chapels with mosaics of the Mysteries of the Rosary, and two curving ramps lead up to the Upper Basilica.