No doubt everyone recognizes the Rosary as a Catholic devotion. Presumably, most Catholics own at least one rosary. Chances are, they pray it while traveling or trying to fall asleep, finding it more comforting than lavender oil. Rosaries hang from rear view mirrors and are in hands of those in coffins. As I research the Rosary, I’m discovering some little known facts about it that are intriguing. Today I’ll share some with you.

History of the Rosary

Long ago people who couldn’t pray the 150 psalms prayed the Our Father on beads called paternosters. Later when the Hail Mary prayer took shape, it replaced the Our Father prayers. In the beginning, only the first half of the Hail Mary was prayed!

Lady Godiva bequeathed her paternoster of gems to a monastery.

St. Dominic and his Dominicans promoted the rosary. However, people were praying the prayers before he lived, and the mysteries arose after he lived. Therefore the idea that Mary gave him the rosary seems to be a legend that a fellow Dominican who lived much later spread.

When Mary appeared at Fatima in 1917, she recommended praying the Fatima Prayer after each decade:     O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, and lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy.

Originally the Assumption and Coronation of Mary were the fourth glorious mystery, and the Second Coming of Christ was the fifth one.

Mary Queen of Scots took her gold rosary with her to her execution in 1587. It had a gold filigree crucifix with an image of Mary on the reverse side. Three drop pearls were attached directly from the circle of fifty beads. Unfortunately, someone stole it from Arundel Castle in 2021.

Chaucer, who wrote the Canterbury Tales, appears in a frontispiece with a rosary in his hand.

Unique Rosaries

The world’s largest rosary is behind Christ King Cathedral in the City of Tagum in the Philippines. It measures 280 feet. Each bead of Magcono wood weighs a little over 77 pounds, and the entire Rosary weighs 6,206 pounds.

The world’s most expensive rosary was sold at auction for $842,500. It was passed down through the Germanic Saxon royal family from the 17th century. It is made of 70 emerald beads spaced by gold rondelles with diamonds embedded. Five emeralds and diamonds set in gold form the cross.

Donald Brown started collecting rosaries in 1917. Before dying in 1975, he had amassed about 4,000 of them from thimble-size to 16 feet long. Some of his rosaries are associated with famous people like President John F. Kennedy, Sister Lúcia, and St. Padre Pio.

Unique Beads

In Windsor, Ohio, foot-high lamps, large, white globes, form a giant rosary. It encircles a fifty-foot-high statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the tallest one of her in the world. A whopping 450,00 one-inch mosaic tiles cover the statue.

A unique rosary sold at the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception and elsewhere has beads like ladybugs. The reason is a legend. In the Middle Ages when insects plagued crops in Europe, people prayed to Mary. Bugs with orange-red wings arrived and devoured the pests. People called their saviors Our Lady’s Bugs, which became ladybugs. Common ladybugs have seven black spots on their wings, said to represent Mary’s seven joys and sorrows.

Sister Angela Salazar made a rosary from baked cotton balls, providing me with a photo for my book about art activities for parents and teachers.

Rosary Facts

In Mary’s apparitions—especially at Fatima—she stressed the importance of praying the rosary for world peace.

In 1949 Brother Sylvan Mattingly, C.F.X. founded Our Lady’s Rosary Makers based in Louisville, Kentucky. Its 17,000 members make and distribute about seven million rosaries a year for Catholic missions, both chain and cord rosaries. See their website.

Pope Leo XIII wrote no less than twelve encyclicals on the Rosary.

An atomic bomb detonated in Hiroshima, Japan in 1945, killed or injured 140,000 people. Eight blocks from the bomb was a house for Jesuits. Surprisingly, although the bomb destroyed the church attached to the house as well as everything around it, the house survived and so did the Jesuits who lived in it. The men suffered only minor injuries. They credited their remarkable survival to the fact that they prayed the Rosary daily in that house.

For some religious communities, like the Rosary Sisters from Jerusalem, the rosary was part of the habit. We Notre Dame Sisters wore ours hanging from a hook at the right side of our waist.

Other Prayer Beads

Islam prayer beads (tasbih) have 99 beads for the 99 names of God. Supposedly Fatima, Muhammad’s daughter made the first set in the seventh century. A smaller version has 33 beads in sets of 11. Muslims use it to count praises of God. For example, on the first set people pray “Glory be to Allah,” on the second set “All praise is due to Allah,” and on the third set, “Allah is the Greatest.” Here is the tasbih that I purchased when I was in the United Arab Emirates:

The Seven Sorrows Rosary comprises seven sets of seven beads. During each set, people pray an Our Father and seven Hail Marys in honor of one of Our Lady’s sorrows. A complement to this rosary is the Seven Joys of Mary Rosary. It has seven decades plus two Hail Marys. This totals 72, the number of years Mary presumably lived on earth.

A novena is praying a prayer for nine days. Therefore the 54 Day Novena is praying three novenas of the rosary (27 days) in petition and three novenas in thanksgiving for a total of 54 days. Special prayers for this are on the Hallow website .

Anglicans and Lutherans have developed their own forms of prayer beads. The Lutheran one is known as the Wreath of Christ.

Annually in London a Rosary Crusade of Reparation occurs. The fortieth one took place on October 13, 2025. More than two thousand people walked two miles, praying the Rosary and singing hymns.

A man in Florida conceived the idea of Hopeful Mysteries of the Rosary to foster hope in people who live in a world in turmoil. Fr. Chris Winklejohn developed the mysteries. Then in 2025, Bishop William Wack gave these mysteries an imprimatur and declared them worthy of devotion. The five Hopeful Mysteries are Creation, the Great Flood, the Exodus, Abraham’s sacrifice, and the Immaculate Conception of Mary.  

For Reflection

Do you have a rosary that has special meaning for you?

When do you pray the Rosary?

Have you ever prayed original mysteries, such as joys you had or Jesus’ miracles?

Here is the Hail Mary prayed in Aramaic, the language of Mary and her Son.