Mariazell

Mariazell a famous place of pilgrimage in Austria, situated on the north border of the crown-land of Styria, twenty-four miles north of Bruck. It consists of a number of inns or lodging-houses, and contains 1200 inhabitants. It is visited by 300,000 pilgrims annually, who come hither to pay homage to an image of the Virgin believed to possess the power of working miracles, which was brought to Mariazell about 1157 by the Benedictine St. Lanmbrecht. A pilgrim chapel was first erected there about. 1200 by margrave Henry I of Moravia. King Louis I of Hungary built a pilgrim church in 1343. The large pilgrim church now standing was built near the end of the 17th century; the miracleworking image is within a chapel, closed by a heavy gate of solid silver. During the great annual procession from Vienna, the greater part of the pilgrims of both sexes spend the night in the woods in drinking, singing, and general riot anid debauchery. See Hillbach, Der Pilger u. Tourist nach Maria Zell (Vienna, 1857, 8vo).