Why go to Santiago de Compostela? Why not the Holy Land or Rome

The sites in the Holy Land, associated with the life and death of Jesus would certainly seem to be of far greater importance that the physical remains of one of his disciples. The distances were daunting, though, and expensive. Piracy sometimes made the Mediterranean inaccessible, and political and military strife made land routes difficult or impossible at times. People who made it there and back were known as “palmers.”

Rome, too, with the remains of Peter and Paul, and several other apostles and early martyrs of note, was a place of pilgrimage that at times drew many more pilgrims than Santiago. It, too, became difficult to reach when northern Italy was beset by periods of seemingly incessant warfare. Pilgrims to Rome, no surprise, came to be known as romeros, a name not entirely uncommon among Hispanics. One of the words for “pilgrimage,” in Spanish, is “romería.”

Santiago, on the other hand, after the Moorish Spaniards had been driven further south on the peninsula, was often more easily and safely accessed. Pilgrims from France, and from whichever countries on its borders were at peace with France, could often make their way with greater hope of reaching their destination and returning safely home than either the Holy Land or Rome. At times it was the only pilgrimage that was possible.