About the Text
This thirteenth-century miracle story is excerpted from a longer text describing the discovery of Ildefonsus’ relics in Zamora and their translation to a shrine.
Ildefonsus was born in Visigothic Spain c. 607 and served as archbishop of Toledo from 657 until his death in 667. He is best known for his vision of the Virgin Mary, who reportedly appeared to him and gave him a chasuble as a reward for his devotion to her.
This miracle story mentions a number of shrines and pilgrimage sites (in Lisbon, Braga, Santiago de Compostela, and Zamora) and captures a sense of rivalry among them–How did pilgrims choose where to visit? Which shrine provided the most effective healing miracles?
Translation
A certain man from Lugo, by the name of Pedro Dominguez, had suffered blindness of the eyes for two years. When he came to visit the shrine of the blessed Vincent [in Lisbon] to recover his health, the most holy Ildefonsus appeared to him there dressed in woolen pontificals, saying about himself that he was small and stocky in stature, but good-enough looking all the same. And [Ildefonsus] said that if [Pedro] wanted to be cured, he should go to Zamora where his [Ildefonsus’] relics were going to be revealed. However, that man [Pedro] did not acquiesce; rather, he went to Braga for another attempt at recovering his health under the auspices of the holy Gerard, and then he visited the shrine of the most holy apostle St. James [in Santiago de Compostela].
But the most holy Ildefonsus appeared to him in these places with the same advice, asserting that he would never receive good health until he visited the shrine of St. Peter in Zamora where his relics were going to be revealed. So, [Pedro] acquiesced to the vision and came to Zamora three days after the discovery of the relics of the most holy Ildefonsus. Although they [i.e. the people at Zamora] worked to dislodge his eyes, dry and shut up as if with glue, they could in no way do so. But they applied the most holy relics to the eyes of the blind man and he called out and fell to the ground as if dead – almost three hundred men were present and saw the above. And then as if dead or possessed by a demon, he lay on the ground for a long time. Then, in response to the voice of the most blessed Ildefonsus awakening him, as he himself asserted, he rose up with his eyesight restored. When he was asked why he cried out when he fell, he responded, ‘It seemed to me that it was as if I had been hit by a spear in the middle of the head and I fell from the magnitude of that blow.’ But at the voice of the most blessed Ildefonsus, as we said before, he rose.
References
Fita, Fidel. “Traslación é invención del cuerpo de San Ildefonso. Reseña histórica por Gil de Zamora.” Madrid, 26 May 1884. Transcription from the following manuscript: Biblioteca nacional; códice I, 247; fol. 26 vuelto-32 recto. Available online here.