"According to tradition the stars themselves marked the way to St. James, for the Milky Way is a heavenly representation of the road to Santiago de Compostela. Other shrines might rival that of St. James in splendor and renown, but no other pilgrimage had mystique develop around the road itself, making the journey almost rival the importance of the shrine in the mind of the pilgrim."

"After many years of missionary activity, James returned to Jerusalem, where he suffered martyrdom under Herod in A.D. 44. His disciples spirited away his body and (the legend is careful to record) his head, placed his earthly remains in a boat, and set sail from Jaffa. In only seven days the ship, propelled miraculously by wind and waves, arrived at the coast of Galicia. As the ship neared the land, a horseman, riding beside the sea, was carried by his bolting horse into the waves, but instead of drowning, horse and rider came to the surface covered with scallop shells. Henceforth, the scallop shell became the symbol of St. James and the badge of the pilgrim to his shrine."

Santiago de Compostela
In the Age of the Great Pilgrimages
by Marilyn Stokstad
from the Centers of Civilization Series
copyright 1978 by the University of Oklahoma Press