Basílica de la Macarena

Basílica de la Macarena Review

This church holds Seville's most revered image, the Virgin of Hope—better known as La Macarena. Bedecked with candles and carnations, her cheeks streaming with glass tears, the Macarena steals the show at the procession on Holy Thursday, the highlight of Seville's Holy Week pageant. The patron of gypsies and the protector of the matador, her charms are so great that young Sevillian bullfighter Joselito spent half his personal fortune buying her emeralds. When he was killed in the ring in 1920, the Macarena was dressed in widow's weeds for a month. The adjacent museum tells the history of Holy Week traditions through processional and liturgical artifacts amassed by the Brotherhood of La Macarena over four centuries.