Veneration of Mary in the Catholic Church "Salutation of the Blessed Virgin" in 1273. By the fourteenth century it was not uncommon to conclude with an appeal for sinners and especially for help at the hour of death. Official recognition of the Ave Maria in its complete form was finally given in the Roman Breviary of 1568. Three Hail Marys is a traditional Roman Catholic devotional practice of reciting three Hail Marys as a petition for purity and other virtues. The practice of saying three Hail Marys in the evening somewhere about sunset had become general throughout Europe in the first half of the fourteenth century and
Veneration of Mary in the Catholic Church with the Virgin Mary, to magnify with her the great things the Lord has done for her, and to entrust supplications and praises to her. The earliest known Marian prayer is the Sub tuum praesidium, or "Beneath Thy Protection", a text for which was rediscovered in 1917 on a papyrus in Egypt dated to c. 250. The papyrus contains the prayer in Greek and is the earliest known reference to the title Theotokos (confirmed by the Council of Ephesus in 431): Beneath your compassion, We take refuge, O Mother of God: do not despise our petitions in time of trouble: