SANTUARIO DELLA MADONNA DI PRADA ---

The Santuario della Madonna di Prada (from the dialect, "dei prati") is located outside the town of Mapello, a locality in the Isola Bergamasca, an area bounded by the Brembo and Adda rivers. The sanctuary is immersed in the vast plain at the eastern foothills of Monte Canto, still surrounded by a natural landscape of great scenic value. The Marian sanctuary of Prada is approached by a suggestive tree-lined avenue stretching as much as 500 meters. A first oratory was probably built as early as the 14th century and then rebuilt in the late 1400s. Popular tradition recounts that the Virgin appeared to a young girl, leaving as a sign a spring of miraculous water that healed numerous sick people. These extraordinary events ceased at the moment when a townswoman dared to