Flourishing of Patronage of Virgin of Candelaria on the Shores of Lake Titicaca with the Image of Copacabana

Abstract

The objective of this work is to study the establishment and diffusion of one of the most famous Marian worships, the one of the Virgin of Candelaria, in one of the sanctuaries of greater notoriety in Hispano–America: Copacabana. This worship bloomed thanks to an old association of the Virgin Mary with the metaphor of the light which could embody a large variaty of meanings: It helped to escape the dangers of the sea, to have abundant harvests, to leave the galleries of a mine and to turn the Indians to Christianity. In Copacabana, the cult to the Virgin facilitated the implantation of evangelisation. Furthermore, the cult would not have achieved the success that it had without the fervent participation of the Christian Spaniards who became its more devotee faithfuls.