26 May 1208.

Once, a poor dumb man was walking along the beach, a place called ‘Rena Bianca’ (the White Beach); he was collecting some wood bits when he had a vision. He saw a light: it was a Lady, and she spoke to him: ‘Go back to the village my son, and tell the priests and the people there to come and take me’.

The poor man was astonished as he tried to let Her understand that he could not speak, but She reassuringly spurred him to go.  And so he went back to the village, and spoke to the people and to the authorities who, seeing the extraordinary fact, believed his words and realised that the Lady he was talking about was the Holy Virgin. Soon a procession was ready to bring the Lady to the village of Sorso. As they reached the place where the Lady was first seen they did not find Her: a statue of the Virgin Mary was there instead, She held the Baby in Her arms.


They placed the statue on a pedestal and walked her back to the village in a procession. Along their way, the men who were holding the statue stopped for a rest in a place not far from the village called ‘Preddugnanu’. There, the Virgin left a mark on a stone with her little foot. Later, the procession arrived to Sorso and brought the statue to the local parish church.On the following day, the statue was not there. The people searched every corner and every land nearby in vane: it had disappeared.

Two days later, a farmer was attending his cattle when he saw the statue sitting on the branches of an olive tree; he ran to the village to give the news. The people gathered up again in a procession and brought the statue back to the parish church. On the following day, alas, the statue disappeared again, and was found near the same olive tree with a carved marble slab at its feet saying: ‘NOLI ME TOLLERE’, ‘Do not move me from here’. 

It was clear to everybody that the Virgin wanted to be left there. So the people made a solemn vow to build a shrine on that spot. The statue was returned to the parish church, and never disappeared thereafter. 4 June 1208. The people gathered in the place where the Holy Virgin had been found, and made decisions as to the Shrine, which was built after a year’s work. On the high altar, built on the spot where the olive tree was, they placed the statue of the Lady.

The marble slab was taken to the village and put on the portal of the church. The statue on the high altar looks at the sea, a sign of Her coming from that sea of peril and menace to the people of Sorso. However, twice a year, the statue turns its head towards the town, to remind her people that the Holy Virgin is there for them too. From that moment on, the Arabs stopped invading the land, and the Lady has graced her people with marvels and miracles since.

THE MIRACLES

Following Her first apparition, the Holy Virgin, has been attributed a number of miracles: invaders and sea pirates disappeared, and Sorso was saved despite its position close to the sea. A big gilded painting on wood from the XVI century, unfortunately gone lost, described five of the miracles of the Holy Virgin.

One of the miracles is the story of a merchant who shipped a large quantity of his goods.  As his boat approached the isle of Asinara, two Arabian ships assaulted it. The merchant, who could see this happening from the shores of Sorso, made a vow to the Holy Virgin, that if his boat were spared along with the crew, he would donate three cassocks.

A tempest came along; the Christian ship was saved and reached the port of Civitavecchia, whereas the Arabian ships drowned at Capo Argentiera. The man waited for the return of his boat, and gratefully kept his vow. Another miracle is the story of a widow’s only son, convicted for murder and sentenced to death, though innocent. The woman went to the Shrine and prayed to the Lady, that She healed her pain and saved her son.


The Holy Virgin listened to the poor widow indeed, and when the young guy was about to be hanged the garrotte broke and he fell to the ground, unscathed. The judge sent a messenger to grant a stay of execution until further enquiry was carried out. The same found the young man was not guilty, set him free and convicted those who had given false testimony against him.

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