There is a day in the history of Fatima that, even today, more than a century later, continues to raise questions, curiosity, and devotion. It is October 13, 1917, the date of the last of the apparitions of the Virgin Mary to the three shepherd children, and above all, the day when, before an immense crowd gathered at the Cova da Iria, what has gone down in history as the Miracle of the Sun would take place.
That day, Fatima was no longer the small place known only to the local inhabitants. Between 50,000 and 70,000 people arrived at the Cova da Iria, driven by curiosity, faith, and the promise of a sign that the three children had said would happen on that very date. The Sanctuary of Fatima indicates this as the sixth and final apparition of the 1917 cycle.
The day was anything but simple. The rain had turned the ground into mud, and the crowd had gathered anyway, waiting for something that no one knew exactly how it would happen. There were pilgrims, curious onlookers, and people who had arrived simply to see with their own eyes what the three shepherd children had announced. Among them were also journalists and observers who did not necessarily share their faith.
According to the account handed down by Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta, the apparition took place while thousands of people were waiting in the Cova da Iria. In this final apparition, the Virgin Mary introduced herself as “the Lady of the Rosary” and asked once again for the Rosary to be recited every day. The message was also an invitation to conversion and to no longer offend God.
But what would transform that October 13th into one of the best-known religious episodes of the twentieth century had yet to happen.
After the apparition, according to the gathered testimonies, the crowd witnessed an extraordinary phenomenon connected to the sun. The Sanctuary of Fatima also preserves the account published a few days later by the Portuguese newspaper O Século, which spoke of a sun that seemed to tremble and make sudden movements, even using the expression that the sun “danced”.
The testimony is particularly interesting because it does not come only from the later accounts of the three shepherd children. The phenomenon was reported by the press of the time, and the journalist Avelino de Almeida, a correspondent for O Século, was present at Fatima. His report was published on October 15, 1917, and described the scene observed by the large crowd gathered at the Cova da Iria.
This is precisely one of the aspects that makes the story so fascinating even today. The Miracle of the Sun did not remain just a story told within the religious tradition of Fatima, but it entered the news of the time almost immediately. The testimonies, of course, do not mean that there is a shared scientific explanation of the phenomenon as a supernatural event today. But they document that on that day a large number of people declared they had witnessed something unusual.
For believers, however, the meaning is much deeper. That phenomenon is considered the sign promised by Our Lady during the apparitions, and for this very reason, October 13 represents the culmination of the entire Fatima story. Our Lady had asked for prayer and conversion and, in the final apparition, had entrusted the three shepherd children with the task of continuing to pray the Rosary.
And then there is one of the most evocative images passed down by Lucia. After the Madonna disappeared, the visionary recounted seeing Saint Joseph with the Child and the Madonna beside the sun, followed by other religious images. This is a part of Lucia’s personal testimony and must therefore be distinguished from the description of the solar phenomenon observed by the crowd.
What makes the day even more unique is the contrast between what happened before and what the crowd later claimed to have seen. A mass of people had arrived in the rain, waiting for a sign that no one could have predicted in its concrete form. A few hours later, Fatima had become the center of public attention, and the story of that apparently “dancing” sun was already beginning to circulate in the press.
More than a hundred years have passed, and October 13, 1917 continues to be remembered every year as the day of the Miracle of the Sun. In Fatima, the memory of that day remains tied to devotion to Our Lady of the Rosary and to a question that still spans history, faith, and the curiosity of millions of people today: what really happened in the sky over the Cova da Iria that day?
It is a question to which faith gives its own answer, while history preserves testimonies, documents, and accounts from that immense crowd. And it is perhaps precisely this combination of mystery, devotion, and testimony that explains why, even today, when talking about Fatima, thoughts inevitably return to that October 13, 1917, and that sun which, according to the words of the witnesses, seemed to dance in the sky.
