sillydoll
Veteran Member
- Time of past OR future Camino
- 2002 CF: 2004 from Paris: 2006 VF: 2007 CF: 2009 Aragones, Ingles, Finisterre: 2011 X 2 on CF: 2013 'Caracoles': 2014 CF and Ingles 'Caracoles":2015 Logrono-Burgos (Hospitalero San Anton): 2016 La Douay to Aosta/San Gimignano to Rome:
Whether you choose to walk 2 000kms of a pilgrim path or only 5km – you are a real pilgrim. Whether you choose to walk, ride, go with a guide, stay in refuges or hotels, you are a real pilgrim.
People sometimes ask, “Did you do the whole camino?”
There is no ‘whole camino’.
There is just the camino.
Most people in Spain don’t have to travel over the border to France or Portugal to walk to the tomb of their Patron Saint. Even if they only live 5kms away, they have walked the camino if they walk to Santiago.
(Over 12 million ‘pilgrims’ visited Santiago in 2004 – the Holy Year.
650 000 made use of the refuges. 179 500 got the Compostela).
In her book “Pilgrimage to Rome in the Middle Ages” (based on her thesis for her doctorate) Debra Birch says:
“The traditional image of the pilgrim tends to be that of a lone individual travelling on foot bearing little more than a scrip and staff. The reality, however, long before the 12th Century, was rather different. Surviving evidence shows that it was not considered unusual for those who could afford it to take a horse or mule on such a journey either to carry the baggage or to ride upon.”
She goes on to describe groups of pilgrims travelling together (mainly for safety sake) often with the guide of an experienced pilgrim.
Aimery Picaud, thought to be the author of the 12th Century Pilgrim Guide to Compostela, certainly expected pilgrims to have a horse and money, exhorting them not to allow the horse to drink from the River Salatus, giving advice on how to get the horse aboard the small water ferry at St Jan-de-Sorde and how much to pay toll keepers. He also describes the various goods one could buy along the way and more so in Santiago – souvenirs, medicines, leather shoes etc.
So, even in the hey-days of pilgrimage – 11th to 12th Centuries – there would have been many different classes of pilgrims from the walking peasant, to the mule riding middleclass, the horse riding gentry with their servants, Knights with their ladies and support staff and the odd King or Queen reclining in a sedan box with their retinue in tow. Some would have stayed in the pilgrim hospices, other might have been a guest in the monasteries whilst many stayed at Inns (watching out for murderous inn-keepers!) and guesthouses. They were all pilgrims and in the Pilgrim Guide it is said that ‘rich or poor .... they must be received with charity and compassion.”
I do not think that 21st Century pilgrims have to walk the ‘whole’ way to be ‘real’ pilgrims. They don’t have to stay in refuges. They don’t have to carry their own baggage. They will still earn the Compostela if they walk the last 100 km and stay in Paradors!
We are all real pilgrims.
People sometimes ask, “Did you do the whole camino?”
There is no ‘whole camino’.
There is just the camino.
Most people in Spain don’t have to travel over the border to France or Portugal to walk to the tomb of their Patron Saint. Even if they only live 5kms away, they have walked the camino if they walk to Santiago.
(Over 12 million ‘pilgrims’ visited Santiago in 2004 – the Holy Year.
650 000 made use of the refuges. 179 500 got the Compostela).
In her book “Pilgrimage to Rome in the Middle Ages” (based on her thesis for her doctorate) Debra Birch says:
“The traditional image of the pilgrim tends to be that of a lone individual travelling on foot bearing little more than a scrip and staff. The reality, however, long before the 12th Century, was rather different. Surviving evidence shows that it was not considered unusual for those who could afford it to take a horse or mule on such a journey either to carry the baggage or to ride upon.”
She goes on to describe groups of pilgrims travelling together (mainly for safety sake) often with the guide of an experienced pilgrim.
Aimery Picaud, thought to be the author of the 12th Century Pilgrim Guide to Compostela, certainly expected pilgrims to have a horse and money, exhorting them not to allow the horse to drink from the River Salatus, giving advice on how to get the horse aboard the small water ferry at St Jan-de-Sorde and how much to pay toll keepers. He also describes the various goods one could buy along the way and more so in Santiago – souvenirs, medicines, leather shoes etc.
So, even in the hey-days of pilgrimage – 11th to 12th Centuries – there would have been many different classes of pilgrims from the walking peasant, to the mule riding middleclass, the horse riding gentry with their servants, Knights with their ladies and support staff and the odd King or Queen reclining in a sedan box with their retinue in tow. Some would have stayed in the pilgrim hospices, other might have been a guest in the monasteries whilst many stayed at Inns (watching out for murderous inn-keepers!) and guesthouses. They were all pilgrims and in the Pilgrim Guide it is said that ‘rich or poor .... they must be received with charity and compassion.”
I do not think that 21st Century pilgrims have to walk the ‘whole’ way to be ‘real’ pilgrims. They don’t have to stay in refuges. They don’t have to carry their own baggage. They will still earn the Compostela if they walk the last 100 km and stay in Paradors!
We are all real pilgrims.