WALSINGHAM

I will & straitly comaunde yt my executors shal fynde a honest man to go on pilgrimage to our Ladye of Wallsyngham, & thei to have to fynde the seid xiijs. Iiijd. & they to gyf him sufficient wagis a daye as thei & he can agre of the seid xiijs. Iiijd.

The pilgrimage to Walsingham was the most distant pilgrimage that Bennett requested, some 90 miles or depending on the route taken. The expenses would have covered the outward and return journey.

Bennett’s pilgrimages were primarily to altars or images of saints. The primary reason to visit Walsingham was not to venerate a relic. The pilgrim went to pray at the replica of Mary’s house where the angel Gabriel told her that she would give birth to Jesus. Although Walsingham had other altars, and some relics too.  

Walsingham was one of the oldest and most important places of pilgrimage in England, and it has become so again in modern times. Lady Richeldis had a dream or vision where Mary instructed her to build a replica of the house where the Annunciation had taken place, when the angel Gabriel told Mary that she would become the mother of Christ. Walsingham had this copy of the Holy House before Loretto in Italy claimed to have the original. Both differ in size, the Loretto building being larger.

There were many routes to Walsingham within Britain, yet we have to remember that pilgrims would travel from their home and return there, using any major roads that made their journey easier. Kings Lynn was the nearest port for those travelling by sea. Those landing at Ipswich could venerate Our Lady of Ipswich, travel to Norwich and then go on to Walsingham. Another option would be to visit the famous relic of the True Cross, the Holy Rood of Bromholm, also on the coast, not far north of the ports of Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth.

There were other images and relics at Walsingham, including what was later believed to be some milk of the Virgin Mary, although the milk may have originally been dust from the grotto in Bethlehem, and over the years people forgot what it actually was and thought that it was milk. Erasmus said that the milk that he was shown resembled chalk powder in egg white.