Marian devotion has represented until today crucial aspect of Christian, especially Catholic, spirituality. Its extraordinary flourishing took plače in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when Pietas Mariana became an imprescindible component of Baroque religiousness. The vigour of Baroque Marian devotion brought about not only the veneration of statues and pictures, but also the reintroduction of pilgrimages and the building of Marian pilgrimage sites throughout the land. One of the most influential Catholic orders that contributed in an important degree to development and spreading of Marian devotion was the Society of Jesus. Aside of their educational and pastora! activities, the Jesuits served as custodians of important Marian pilgrimage sites, as was also the case of the residence in Golčův Jeníkov, where they remained in the years 1657-1773. Throughout this time, they constructed Marian pilgrimage site of regional importance where religious brotherhood had been established and where Loretan devotion had been spread. The everyday life of the residence brought about many activities, among them the organization of festivals along the lines of Baroque ostentatiousness and regular radius of pilgrimages.
Jan Raymund (1737-1808) was a member of the Maltese convent of Our Lady beneath the Chain in Prague. He worked as a preacher and later also a parish priest at the church of Our Lady Victorious in Prague. He is the author of a number of printed books containing mainly sermons. Five volumes with manuscript collections of his sermons and one short historiographical work have been preserved as well. He created a library with more than 1,300 simple shelf marks, of which it has been possible to trace 111 volumes., Pavel Trnka., and Obsahuje bibliografické odkazy