One story said that the venerated image is based on an appearance of Mary to a young girl in Spain, and that the painting was brought to Hispaniola by two brothers when the Spanish were establishing a colony; another says that a girl on the island had a dream of the "Virgin of Altagracia," prompting her father to find the image and bring it to the village of Salvaleón de Higüey around 1500.

The red, according to the experts, she wears because she is a beautiful human being; the white because she is a woman conceived without sin; and the blue cloak because "the power of the Most High will come upon you" (c.f.

In front of the Mother is the Christ Child, naked, asleep on straw and well behind him is Saint Joseph, dressed in a red cape and with a candle in his left hand.

On her chest there is a kind of white lightning in the shape of a triangle — an expression of the virgin birth of Jesus — that rises from the manger where the child sleeps almost to the shoulders of the Mother.

Mary's face is serene, with her eyes lowered, indicating neither seriousness nor sadness, but rather joy and peace, in an attitude of meditation.

It was in Extremadura, in the town of Garrovillas de Alconetar, where the Virgin Mary was said to have appeared to a shepherd girl on top of a rock.

Passing through the town of Los Dos Ríos, he stayed overnight at an inn, where he described the case of the unknown Virgin, expressing his sorrow at the prospect of returning home without item that his daughter had requested.

Juan Pepén recounts that the girl met her father in the same place where the old sanctuary of Higüey is located today and that there, on January 21.

At the foot of an orange tree, she showed the image to those present, establishing that day the venerated cult of the Virgin of Altagracia.

The majority of those who made up the militias came from the areas of El Seybo and Higüey, and the faith they professed in the Virgin of Altagracia was present, since they were practitioners of the devotion to her.

Before entering combat early in the morning, the Spanish-Dominicans implored the help of the Virgin of Mercy under the title of the Lady of Alta Gracia, so that by her grace she would help them to be victorious.

However, it was during the leadership of Monsignor Arturo de Meriño, Archbishop of Santo Domingo, that the Holy See was asked to grant a Divine Office and designated Mass for the day of the Virgin of the Altagracia.

The authorities were begged, in addition, that a mandatory holiday be established on January 21; the date of August 15 might have been chosen, except that it was already the Catholic feast of the Assumption of Mary.

In the Dominican Republic, the official declaration of January 21 as a non-working day, a national and religious holiday throughout the country, was approved by law.

The devotion to Nuestra Señora de la Altagracia began in Higüey and spread over the years until it became national and became part of the Dominican identity.

According to the Dominican historian Alejandro Paulino Ramos, Altagracian devotion began in the mid-16th century in Hispaniola, both in the area of Santo Domingo and in the then town of Higüey.

According to Bishop Ramón Benito, it is the story about the Trejo brothers that seems the most logical because, “they come from Extremadura; there the Altagracia is popular; It is known that when leaving the homeland each one took with him the devotion to his region; These two brothers settled in Higüey on the Island of Hispanola; there they took the image of the Virgin of their devotion.”[12] Argentina Spain Panama Dominican Republic[6] Venezuela Peru Mexico