The medal represents Ours Lady of Guadalupe, the appellative with which the Catholics revere Maria beause of an apparition happened in Mexico in the 1531.
According to the traditional story, between December 9 and 12th 1531, on the hill of the north Tepeyac of City of Mexico, Maria appeared various times to Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin, an Aztec converted to the Christianity. The name Guadalupe would have been dictated by same Maria to Juan Diego: some have hypothesized that it is the transcript in Spanish of the Aztec expression Coatlaxopeuh, “she that crushes the snake” (cfr. Genesis 3,14 -15).
In memory of the apparition, on the place a chapel immediately was erected, replaced at first in 1557 from another greater chapel and then from a real consecrate sanctuary in the 1622.
