The House of Virgin Mary is located on Mount Bülbül (8 km from ephesus).

A Germen nun Anne Catherine Emmerich had a vision of the house of The Virgin Mary and described it to the Germen Writer Clemens Brentano who published a book about it. Catherine died in 1884. In 1891 two Lazarist missionaries from Smyrna (Izmir) rediscovered the building.

The building is a typical Roman construction, entirely made of stones. In the 4th century AD, a church, combining the house and her grave, has been built. The original two-stored house consisted of an anteroom, bedroom and praying room and a room with fireplace.The kitchen fell into ruins and has been restored in 1940’s. Today, only the central part and a room on the right of the altar can be seen by the visitors. One can easily see that this building looks more like a church than a house. Another place that worths to visit is, a spring water source to be found at the exit of the church area and where a rather salt water, with curative properties, can be drunk.

The house was from the 6th C AD but the foundations were from the 1st C AD. In 1896 it was declared a shrine of the Roman Catholic Church by Pope Leo XIII.

Pope Paul VI. Visited the house in 1967, Pope John Paul II. ?n 1979 and Pope Benedict XVI. in 2006.