It has bled almost every day since Good Friday, the woman named only as Renate D. told the local press. "Somehow it's like a miracle but I can't explain it," she said.

She described herself as "pious but not fanatical" and said she wouldn't dream of making the story up or manipulating the figurine she bought 15 years ago for the equivalent of €40 during a visit to Catholic Poland.

She also claimed to have witnessed an apparition of the Virgin Mary, who instructed her to talk about the suffering in the world.

The local priest has visited the woman and came away saying it appeared to be an "individual religious experience" by a single person. The chair of the diocese has said it will launch an investigation if further checks warrant it.

Reporters from the local newspaper, the Traunsteiner Tagblatt, visited the flat and said the face, hands, feet and robe of the 30 centimeter white gipsum figure appeared to be smeared with blood.

The newspaper conducted forensic tests on the blood and found it to be human. Now the reporters claim to have solved the mystery but won't say who they think is behind it. They first want to compare the Madonna blood smears with blood from the people they suspect. The only problem is that their suspects are refusing to submit to blood tests.

On Monday, the mystery continued.

The electronic recreations represent nearly ten years of work by an extensive team of architects, archaeologists, historians, technical experts and Native Americans. Project director is John Hancock, professor of architecture at the University of Cincinnati, working in partnership with the Center for the Reconstruction of Historical and Archaeological Sites (CERHAS) at the University of Cincinnati. The title of the project and the coming traveling exhibit is: "EarthWorks: Virtual Explorations of the Ancient Ohio Valley."

The "EarthWorks" reconstructions will be the centerpiece within a 500-square-foot traveling exhibit which will also include a graphic timeline wall with cross cultural comparisons; a giant map wall of the Ohio River Valley (from the approximate location of Pittsburgh to Louisville) indicating placement of Native American earthworks; panels with diagrams, photos and text; and 3-D topographic models of five earthwork sites. The exhibit opens June 20, 2006, at the Cincinnati Museum Center. It remains at the museum center till Sept. 7, 2006. Later venues include the Ohio Historical Center, Columbus, opening on Sept. 30, 2006. Discussion are now underway for later exhibits in the state and nation.

Set amid the physical elements of the exhibit, the 3-D virtual reconstructions by Hancock and his team recreate the earthworks for school children and scholars alike. The centerpiece of the exhibit is a large screen on which the 3-D explorations of "EarthWorks" by a user at the touch-screen computer can be shared with a larger audience. Virtual exploration of a gallery of period artifacts is also possible at two stand-alone kiosk stations.

The project is built upon archaeological data gleaned from such modern technology as sensing devices and aerial photography as well as frontier maps and other aids provided by archaeologists to re-establish the location, size, shape and appearance of many of the region's earthworks. Then, using architectural software and high-resolution computer modeling and animation, the UC-led team virtually rebuilt these massive structures and further created animated, interactive, narrated "tours" among them..

Funding for the traveling exhibit has been provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities. In all, the NEH has provided close to $500,000 for the project. Additional development support over the years has come from the Ohio Board of Regents, the Ohio Humanities Council, the Ohio Arts Council, the George Fund Foundation, and in-kind donations from the University of Cincinnati. Add up all funding and in-kind donations, and project support totals around $1.5 million.

Directing the project is John Hancock, UC professor of architecture, who collaborated with the Center for the Reconstruction of Historical and Archaeological Sites (CERHAS) at UC. "It's funny how I came to this project," Hancock recalled. "A graduate student came to me and said, 'I want to do my thesis on the ancient earthworks of Ohio.' I said, 'The what?' I'd been teaching ancient architecture here for 15 years, and I didn't know anything about the truly remarkable roadways and geometric ceremonial monuments built by brilliant native cultures that preceded us here. I literally said, 'I had no idea!' and they were right here under our feet."

Just so. The massive earthworks are a phenomenon, but remain mostly unknown even though estimates of their one-time numbers range from a few hundred to 10,000. They survived intact up to the 19th century, but, now, it's estimated that 80 percent of the once-extant "mounds" have been destroyed due to farming, looting, highways and sprawl. Made of earth, they were easy to alter or erase. And so, the extent, scope and power of these works - which may have included an ancient 60-mile highway stretching between Newark and Chillicothe in Ohio - has remained hidden.

Destruction of the mounds

In the early 19th century, the existence of these mammoth works served as a launching point for American archaeology and was the subject of the first volume published by America's newly founded Smithsonian Institution. That text, the Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, was published in 1848 and recorded the abundance of earthworks across the region.

Even the earliest archaeologists contributed to the destruction of these prehistoric monuments. Nineteenth-century archaeologists gouged out earthworks, seeking the burial remains and artifacts (pottery, stone smoking pipes shaped like otters and ravens, headdresses with copper antlers and engraved tablets, as well as ornaments worked from copper, silver, translucent mica and stone) placed inside.

The mounds and their function

Even though some are so large that they rival the buildings of Mexico's empires, the "mounds" were a subtle form of architecture, according to Hancock. They first took shape as cones and ridges (the simplest forms) and evolved to more complicated structures: giant geometric outlines, symmetrical octagons, perfect squares and, eventually, snakes and possums.

It's thought that the earthworks were landscape markers and ceremonial centers tied to festivals (including marriage, death and burial), social and cosmological ideas of order, astronomical events and territorial agreements (likely tied to the emergence of planting and agriculture). In the case of hilltop enclosures, fortification may have been a minor or temporary - but by no means primary - motivation for construction.

The promises and pay-offs from the "virtual" rebuilding project

Given the challenge that most of the earthworks have been destroyed, how did Hancock and the team of UC students and faculty, scholars from around the country, archaeologists, graphic designers, artists, videographers and others piece the fragments together in order to rebuild and interpret these works? How could they begin even knowing where to site them, since most have been paved, trampled, plundered, cultivated or overgrown? First, there are the 19th-century historical records and maps. They also made use of aerial photographs and satellite images. Also, some ground-level remains enable them to mark and chart and make newly visible the till-now hidden ancient culture.

Explained Hancock, "In our interactive video environments, people can explore the sites as if they were newly created, when the river valleys of middle America were lined with these vast, precise earthworks. In the project, we've also placed related topics on life-ways of these peoples, their artistry, and practice of astronomy." He hopes UC's "EarthWorks" will emerge as the primary public resource on the ancient Ohio Valley cultures.

Hancock added, "Think of the cathedrals of medieval Europe or Machu Pichu or the pyramids of ancient Egypt. Ancient cultures need vivid, iconic, architectural images in order to hold a prominent place in the popular imagination. These computer renderings will enable the modern imagination to see and to understand what has been destroyed over the last 200 years."

Analysts and some Sufis partly credit reaction to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States for the atmosphere that has made the changes possible. When it was discovered that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi, the kingdom's strict Wahhabi doctrine -- which had banned all other sects and schools of thought -- came under intense scrutiny from inside and outside the country. The newfound tolerance Sufis have come to enjoy is perhaps one of the most concrete outcomes of that shift.

"This is one of the blessings of September 11. It put the brakes on the [Wahhabi] practice of takfir , excommunicating everyone who didn't exactly follow their creed," said Sayed Habib Adnan, a 33-year-old Sufi teacher. The government "realized that maybe enforcing one religious belief over all others was not such a good idea."

When Adnan moved to Saudi Arabia from his native Yemen four years ago, Sufi gatherings were often clandestine, sometimes held in orchards outside the city, or in basements and without microphones, for fear of drawing attention. "I couldn't wear this," he said, pointing to his turban. "Or this," he said, pulling at his white cotton overcoat. "Or I would be branded a Sufi. You couldn't even say the word 'Sufi.' It was something underground, dangerous, like talking about drugs."

Sufis here say they are not a separate sect or followers of a separate religion, but adherents to a way of life based on the Muslim concept of ihsan . Muhammad explained ihsan to the angel Gabriel as "worshiping God as if you see Him. Because if you don't see Him, He sees you." Another Sufi characteristic is a strong belief in the power of blessings from the prophet, his close relatives and his companions.

Sufism had previously been predominant in Hejaz, the western region of Saudi Arabia, which includes Muhammad's birthplace, Mecca; Medina, where he is buried; and the Red Sea port city of Jiddah. Muslims prayed often at shrines where the prophet's daughter Fatima, his wife Khadija and his companions were buried. Mawlids were public affairs with entire cities decked out in lights, and parades and festivities commemorating the prophet's birthday and his ascension to Jerusalem.

When the al-Saud family that would later come to rule Saudi Arabia took over Hejaz in the 1920s, the Wahhabis banned mawlids as a form of heresy and destroyed the historic shrines of Khadija, Fatima and the prophet's companions, fearing they would lead to idolatry and polytheism.

Wahhabis, crucial allies in the Saud conquest of the disparate regions that became Saudi Arabia in 1932, were awarded control of religious affairs.

Discrimination against Sufis, among others, intensified after armed Wahhabi extremists took over Mecca's Grand Mosque in 1979, demanding that a more puritanical form of Islam be applied in the country. Though the government quelled the uprising and executed its leaders, authorities were shaken by the incident, and lest other Wahhabis defy them, they allowed them more rein.

Soon after, extremist clerics issued a religious edict, or fatwa, declaring Sufi's spiritual leader, Muhammad Alawi Malki, a nonbeliever. He was removed from his teaching position, banned from giving lessons at the Grand Mosque, where both his father and grandfather had taught, and interrogated by the religious police and the Interior Ministry. After Malki was later attacked by a throng of radicals incensed at his presence in the mosque, he could pray there only under armed guard.

Meanwhile, thousands of cassettes and booklets circulated calling Sufis "grave-lovers" and dangerous infidels who had to be stopped before they made a comeback. Their salons were raided, and those caught with Sufi literature were often arrested or jailed.

The tide finally turned in 2003, with the new atmosphere that took hold following the Sept. 11 attacks, when the future King Abdullah, then the crown prince, held a series of meetings to acknowledge the country's diverse sects and schools of thought. One of the guests was Sufi leader Malki. When he died the following year, Abdullah and the powerful defense and interior ministers attended his funeral. The rehabilitation of his legacy was almost complete.

"We were then upgraded from infidels, to people who are ignorant and practicing their religion wrong," said Wasif Kabli, a 59-year-old businessman.

But many Sufis complain that despite outward appearances, Wahhabis continue to destroy shrines in and around their holy places, their salons continue to be raided and their literature is still banned.

Wahhabis and Sufis view Islam from opposite directions. To Wahhabis, who emerged from the kingdom's stark, harsh desert, a believer's relationship can be only directly with God. To them, Sufis' celebrations of the prophet's life smack of idolatry, and supplications to him, his relatives and companions appear to replace or bypass the link with God.

Sufis answer that the prophet celebrated his own birthday by fasting on Mondays, that he himself offered to intervene with God on behalf of Muslims and that he could often be found in the evenings at the grave sites of his wives and companions.

Last month, on the occasion of the prophet's birthday, a crowd of more than 1,000 gathered to celebrate at a private residence. Sufi books, cassettes and DVDs were selling out in one corner of the large garden where the event was held. Adnan, the Sufi teacher, was one of four speakers who addressed the crowd. He asked: Why are we Sufis always on the defensive? "Nobody asks [soccer] fans for religious proof that sanctifies their gatherings at the stadium because of their devotion to their team," he said. "How come we are always asked for an explanation of our devotion to our beloved prophet?"

Muhammad Jastaniya, a 20-year-old economics major and part of a new wave of young Saudis who have embraced Sufism, said what drew him was the focus on God.

On a recent moonlit evening, Jastaniya sipped sugary mint tea with his friends on rugs spread on the rooftop of a Zawiya, or lodge where Sufis go to meditate, chant or sit in on lessons. The words 'God' and 'Muhammad' were written in green neon lights, and Islam's 99 names for God were stenciled in black paint around the wall. "To be a Sufi is to clear your heart of everything but God," he explained. "The Islam we were taught here is like a body without a soul. Sufism is the soul. It's not an alternative religion -- it can contain all Muslims."

That thought seems to be taking hold, even in faraway corners.

Salman al-Odah, the country's most popular puritanical cleric, who was jailed in the 1990s for opposing the presence of U.S. troops in the kingdom, accepted an invitation to visit Sufi cleric Abdallah Fadaaq's mawlid and lesson last week. The scene at Fadaaq's house was an obvious sign of conciliation.

Al-Odah sat with his hands neatly folded in his lap, wearing a red-and-white checkered headdress and clear wraparound glasses and sporting the short scraggly beard that indicates a conservative. Fadaaq, who at 39 is emerging as the new symbol of Hejazi Sufism, wore the white turban, the white overcoat and shawl typical of Sufis, wooden prayer beads resting on his lap. "It's true that there are differences between the way people practice their faith in this country, and this is an indication that people are using their minds and thinking, which is a good thing," Fadaaq said. "But what we should concentrate on are the expanses that bring us together, like the prophet. We must take advantage of what we have in common."