Devotion to Mary is old, really old. The earliest recorded prayer to Mary comes from an Egyptian

manuscript of the second or third century, containing a version of a Greek prayer that would come

to be a Latin prayer called Subtum Precidium. Some of you probably know the prayer, either because

you say it by itself or have said it as part of

other prayers it goes like this we fly to thy patronage o holy mother of god despise not our petitions

and our necessities but deliver us always from all dangers o O glorious and blessed Virgin Mary, amen.

The prayer exists in many different versions,

but the elements are always the same.

Invocation of Mary as mother of God,

a plea for protection and intercession,

an exclamation regarding some quality Mary possesses.

The Council of Ephesus, which formally declared Mary Theotokos, Godbearer, Mother of God,

was not held until 4.31. That means invoking Mary as Mother of God was already customary

by that time, and central to Marian devotion.

Interest in Mary's maternity is also the subject of one of the earliest non-canonical

Christian writings, the proto-evangelium of James, a mid-second century work that gives us a number

of traditions surrounding Mary, like the names of her parents,

Joachimanin.

This ancient text has a special concern for Mary as mother, and particularly as virgin mother,

since the text is at great pains to affirm that Mary was a virgin during birth.

That is, she did not suffer any loss of physical integrity due to giving

birth. This early affirmation of Mary's virginity in part two affirmed her son's divinity,

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