The Pilgrimage

How many pilgrims were there? And how soon? Authenticity of some of the earliest documents is controversial. Some posit that Italian pilgrims visited sometime in the 7th C., even before the discovery of the relics, although that seems unlikely. What is certain, however, is that by the mid-10th century a European pilgrimage tradition to Compostela was beginning to form. By the middle of the next century, the pilgrimage had become big business as large groups of nobles, churchmen, and laypeople from all over Europe flocked to the Apostle's tomb. An infrastructure was developed. Hospices dotted the landscape.

At the height of its popularity in the eleventh and twelfth centuries over half a million people a year are said to have made the pilgrimage from different parts of Europe, the majority of them from France.The high point of the pilgrimage occurred between the years 1000 and 1500 but although numbers dwindled after that, due to the Reformation and other, political, factors, the stream of pilgrims making the trudge westwards never completely dried up and in the late twentieth century is making something of a comeback.

At present, thousands of pilgrims walk the Way every year, whether from the Pyrenees, from different parts of France or from even further afield: it is not uncommon, even nowadays, to meet Swiss, German, Belgian or Dutch pilgrims, for example, who have set out from home to make the entire journey on foot. Most parts of the walker's route are also accessible to those riding mountain (though not touring) bikes.

The Camino Frances takes about a month and there are a number of refugios set up to accommodate the genuine pilgrim, not the tourist. Some of these are in old monasteries, inns and seminaries. Others are provided by the villages along the way. Some are in grand establishments like the old Augustine abbey of Roncesvalles in the Pyrenees or the 12 centaury seminary at Puerto Reina.

Some statistics
The Cathedral at Santiago records the number of pilgrims receiving the Compostela each year:

Many pilgrims only walk the last 100 kilometers (66 miles), because that entitles them to a certificate to show that they walked the Camino. The real hikers do the 800 km Camino or even more. Some even starting in their home town in various countries, just as pilgrims did many centuries ago.

Roughly 70% of pilgrims each year are men, 30% women (though the proportion was closer to 60:40 in both 1998 and 2000); 70% make the journey on foot, 30% by bike (though in 2000 the proportion was closer to 80:20) . The statistics for 2000 (possibly still untypical, though not a Holy Year) show that  44% of pilgrims were under 30; 36% were between 31 and 50.  The percentage of those over 50 has grown from 16% in 1997 to 20% in 2000. And 7% were over 70.  Most pilgrims are Spanish (ca 70%), with Germans and French predominant among the remainder.