<P> According to a Dominican tradition, the rosary was given to Saint Dominic in an apparition by the Blessed Virgin Mary in the year 1214 in the church of Prouille . This Marian apparition received the title of Our Lady of the Rosary . In the 15th century Blessed Alanus de Rupe (aka Alain de la Roche or Saint Alan of the Rock), who was a learned Dominican priest and theologian, is said to have received a vision from Jesus about the urgency of reinstating the rosary as a form of prayer . Blessed Alanus de Rupe also said that he received the Blessed Mother's "15 Promises". Before his death on September 8, 1475 he reinstituted the rosary in many countries and established many rosary confraternities . Despite the popularity of Blessed Alanus's story about the origins of the rosary, there has never been found any historical evidence positively linking St. Dominic to the rosary . The story of St. Dominic's devotion to the rosary and supposed apparition of Our Lady of the Rosary does not appear in any documents of the Church or Dominican Order prior to the writings of Blessed Alanus, some 300 years later . </P> <P> During the middle ages, evidence suggests that both the Our Father and the Hail Mary were recited with prayer beads . In 13th century Paris, four trade guilds existed of prayer bead makers, who were referred to as paternosterers, and the beads were referred to as paternosters, suggesting a continued link between the Our Father (Pater noster in Latin) and the prayer beads . </P> <P> In the 12th century, the rule of the English anchorites, the Ancrene Wisse, specified how groups of 50 Hail Marys were to be broken into five decades of ten Hail Marys each . Gradually, the Hail Mary came to replace the Our Father as the prayer most associated with beads . Eventually, each decade came to be preceded by an Our Father, which further mirrored the structure of the monastic Divine Office . </P> <P> The practice of meditation during the praying of the Hail Marys is attributed to Dominic of Prussia (1382--1460), a Carthusian monk, who called it "Life of Jesus Rosary". The German monk from Trier added a sentence to each of the 50 Hail Marys already popular at his time, using quotes from scriptures . Promoted by his superior Adolf von Essen and others, his practice became popular among Benedictines and Carthusians from Trier to adjoining Belgium and France, where it was greatly promoted by the preaching of the Dominican priest Alan de Rupe, who helped to spread the devotion in France, Flanders, and the Netherlands between 1460 and his death in 1475 . </P>

When did the name rosary come into use