Ferragosto: Feast of the Assumption

Assumption of the Virgin, Santa Maria in Trastevere

---

August 15th is the Feast of the Assumption. The day is a national holiday in Italy, where it is known as Ferragosto, a word that comes from Feriae Augusti, the festival of Augustus (r. 27 BCE-14 CE), Rome's first emperor. 

The feast celebrates the taking up to heaven of the soul and body of the Virgin Mary. There is no scriptural foundation for this event; it rests solely on apocryphal literature from the 3rd and 4th centuries. Such writings relate that Mary was surrounded on her death-bed by the apostles when Jesus appeared and bore her soul away. Three days later angels bore Mary's body to Paradise, where it was reunited with her soul. 
​
The Assumption of Mary was only declared an article of faith on November 1st 1950, when Pope Pius XII (r. 1939-58) issued the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus, in which it was affirmed that Mary, 'when the course of her earthly life was finished...was assumed (Latin: assumpta est: taken up) body and soul into the glory of Heaven'. 

---

Santa Maria Maggiore