Reconstructing Reality
Marco Corvaglia's website
The Shroud: The True and the Unfounded History
by Marco Corvaglia
The Shrouds Preceding the Shroud
The Shroud of Turin: Detail of the frontal image (with contrasting colors).
The phenomenon of the appearance of relics considered to be Jesus' burial cloth originated in the Holy Land between the 6th and 7th centuries.
The oldest evidence relates to a burial headscarf, as noted by Professor Andrea Nicolotti, Professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Turin:
The first testimony, in fact, to the burial garments will not occur until we find mention in an anonymous pilgrim from Piacenza who made a trip to Palestine between 551 and 637 (most likely between 560 and 570): "On that bank of the Jordan there is a cave [...].. The sudarium that had been placed upon the Lord’s forehead is said to be in that the same place".
The anonymous author from Piacenza, however, would seem to lack sufficient acumen and to harken rather easily to disparate oral traditions. Among the strangest relics one finds in this text are the abecedary of Jesus and the tree trunk on which he sat when he was in school with other children, the jug from which he drank, a stone on which he had climbed that preserved his footprints, the stones cast to murder Saint Stephen, the bones of the children butchered by Herod, and the cup the apostles used for the celebration of the Eucharist.
[Andrea Nicolotti, The Shroud of Turin: The History and Legends of the World's Most Famous Relic, Baylor University Press, 2019, pp. 17-18]
Not long after, accounts began circulating of shrouds, in the limiting sense that this word has largely taken on in modern languages, i.e., full-body burial cloths. (In Greek, the word sindon [σινδών] can instead also mean small cloths.).
Between the 9th and 14th centuries in Europe, as notes Nicolas Sarzeaud from the University of Lorraine, at least a hundred shrouds and burial cloths (whole or in fragments) of Jesus appeared:
In the 11th century, these appearances escalate. There are three new mentions in the first half of this century and ten in the second, and there are twenty-two mentions in the 12th century, twenty-eight in the 13th and twenty-one in the 14th...
[Nicolas Sarzeaud, Les Suaires du Christ en Occident, Cerf, 2024, p. 21]
The vast majority of these appeared in modern-day France, especially in the northeast and surrounding areas, so much so that one can speak of a veritable “northern hotbed, centered around the strongholds of the kings of France and the German emperors” [ibid., p. 38].
It’s worth noting that for several centuries, it was about blank fabrics, that is, fabrics without images.
The first testimony (unconfirmed, however, by any other source) that refers to to the existence of the image of Jesus on one of his alleged burial cloths dates back to the early 13th century, the period when, in 1204, the Crusaders conquered Constantinople.
Two reputable academics specializing in the medieval period, Catholics Franco Cardini (Professor Emeritus of the Scuola Normale in Pisa and Harvard Fellow) and Marina Montesano (University of Messina and San Raffaele in Milan), in fact, refer to:
Robert de Clari, a Picard who put together an account of the events of the Fourth Crusade, and who in two passages, speaks of the relics preserved in Constantinople. Regarding the church of St. Mary of Blachernae […], here’s what he says:
"And among the rest, there was another of the churches which they called My Lady Saint Mary of Blachernae, where was kept the sydoine in which Our Lord had been wrapped, which stood up straight every Friday so that the features of Our Lord could be plainly seen there’ And no one, either Greek or French, ever knew what became of this sydoine after the city was taken.”
[Franco Cardini, Marina Montesano, La Sindone di Torino oltre il pregiudizio, Medusa, 2015, p. 57]
Thus, it can be argued that before the appearance of the Shroud of Turin, "among the various relics or alleged relics that were referred to as shrouds, none bear the entire imprinted image of Christ, nor does any source mention it — with one exception, as we have already mentioned: Robert de Clari” [ibid., p. 99].
Moreover, one can’t help but notice that the churches of Constantinople at the time housed hundreds of unlikely relics: the basin Jesus used to washe his disciples' feet, Jesus' and Mary's sandals, the baskets used in the multiplying of the bread and fish and the letter Jesus allegedly wrote to Abgar [cf. N. Guyard, Les Reliques du Christ: Une histoire du sacré en Occident, Cerf, 2022, pp. 67-72].
Additionally, Robert de Clari himself, immediately upon referring to the aforementioned shroud, writes that in St. Mary of Blachernae, there was also "the marble slab on which Our Lord was laid when He was taken down from the Cross, and there could still be seen there the tears which Our Lady had let fall upon it” [Robert of Clari, The Conquest of Constantinople (Translated with introduction and notes by Edgar Holmes McNeal), Columbia University Press, 2005, pp. 112-113].
The Shroud Appears: Opposed, Tolerated and Disputed
The Shroud of Turin bears a frontal and dorsal image of a scourged man, with blood-red spots on various parts of his body, including his face and side: no evidence can be found of its existence before 1355-1356.
At that time, it’s reported to appear in a collegiate church (i.e., one endowed with a chapter of canons) founded shortly before by feudal lord Geoffroi de Charny in the village of Lirey, Diocese of Troyes, located in the Champagne region of northeastern France.
The bishop of Troyes, Henri de Poitiers, soon requires the canons of Lirey to stop displaying what he considers an artifact that defrauds the faithful.
We know this from a well-known memorial written in late 1389 by his successor, Pierre d'Arcis, according to whom Henri even discovered the name of the artist who made the image.
Cardini and Montesano put forth this speculation:
It can be assumed that it was the reading or, at any rate, the perhaps only indirect knowledge of Robert's testimony concerning the Blacherne church that inspired in Geoffroy [...] the idea based on which the anonymous artist from Troyes mentioned by Bishop Henri would have made – perhaps purely for devotional purposes and without any intention of malice – the image later venerated in the church of Lirey.
[Cardini, Montesano, pp. 99-100]
The two academics leave two details implied which actually seem to strengthen their hypothesis (which, in any case, remains obviously as such): Champagne, the historic region of France in which Lirey is located, borders Picardy, where Robert of Clari was from and where this story can be assumed to have been most well known. Moreover, in the years immediately preceding the appearance of the Shroud, until 1352, Geoffroi had been governor of Picardy.
According to the memorial, however, following Henri of Poitiers' orders, "the canons of Lirey would withdraw the relic, only to relocate it in the church some 34 years later, precisely at the time when Pierre d'Arcis writes" [G. M. Zaccone, La Sindone. Storia di una immagine, Paoline, 2010, p. 110].
Pierre d'Arcis wants it removed again.
Professor Gian Maria Zaccone (Pontifical Athenaeum Regina Apostulorum), appointed director of the International Center for Sindology in 2017 (today referred to as the International Center for Shroud Studies), notes that that the bishop, because of his stance, was
unnecessarily and unjustly reviled by so many writers on the subject of shrouds yet, on the other hand, exalted as a pioneer of rational criticism of popular religions. [...] I think the bishop’s honesty and courage should be recognized and that he should be understood and excused as the shepherd responsible for the flock entrusted to him. [...] Pierre d'Arcis, Bishop of Troyes, is alarmed. [...] Where did this unusual object come from? It seems no one knows or wants to say.
[Ibid., pp. 113-114]
To resolve the dispute, on January 6, 1390, Pope Clement VII in Avignon issued a public decree, which was issued again with non-substantive corrections on May 30, allowing displays while simultaneously requiring that the clergy of Lirey at least each time a sermon is given (and we quote from the final wording of the decree):
should preach publicly to the people and say in a loud, intelligible voice, stopping any deception, that the aforementioned figure or representation they display not as the true shroud of our Lord Jesus Christ, but as a figure or representation of the aforementioned shroud...
[Nicolotti, p. 107 (the Vatican Secret Archive, Registra Avenionensis 261, f. 259r)]
A few decades later, Margaret of Charny, granddaughter of the collegiate founder, vying for possession of the cloth from the canons, began organizing displays around Europe, presenting it once again as authentic.
In 1453, Margaret gives the Shroud to Duke Louis of Savoy. “The transfer was surely in exchange for consideration, i.e., for money” [Zaccone, La Sindone. Una storia nella storia, Effatà, 2015, p. 36].
Mandylion-Shroud?
In 1978 British essayist Ian Wilson led to a turning point in syndonology (although theoretically neutral, in common speech the word denotes the field of study which, with the help of various disciplines, actually supports the authenticationist theories relating to the Shroud of Turin).
Drawing on a theory that had already been put forward in the late 19th century, Wilson formulated a hypothesis that found little support among academic historians, but which spread widely among the nonspecialist public through countless sindonological publications.
The hypothesis would make it possible to shorten the centuries-long period during which there is no evidence of the existence of the relic in question: the Shroud of Turin, which is nearly 4.5 meters long, would be identified with the Image (i.e., the Mandylion or the Holy Face) of Edessa.
If this were the case, Jesus' burial cloth would have therefore appeared in Edessa, a thousand kilometers from the places of his Passion, several centuries after his death, with a legendary tradition behind it that – for whatever it may be worth – made no connection with that death (as we’ve already seen in Images Not Made by Human Hand?).
According to Wilson's conjecture, the Shroud was mistakenly perceived as a small cloth on which only the face of Jesus was reproduced, as during the first millennium it was, for unknown reasons, stored and displayed folded so that only the face was visible.
In reality, physicist, sindologist and Catholic Deacon Liberato De Caro points out:
The Shroud of Turin shows the presence of marks left in the fabric weave by various creases, visible when viewed under grazing light, folded in half by 4, 8, 12, up to 48 times. It’s presumed that the Shroud was folded several times, if for no other reason than for transport, it being more than four meters long. If, however, the Shroud had always been folded the same way for centuries and conserved in such a way as to allow only the part with the face to be seen, the fibers at the folds would have been irreversibly structurally damaged, and the creases in the linen would be so deep that they’d be visible even to the naked eye and not just under grazing light.
[Liberato De Caro, Sindone. Un mistero millenario, Fede & Cultura, 2024, p. 148]
From a historical and iconographic point of view, Professor Zaccone writes:
The Edessa theory has known, and currently knows, even prominent supporters and as many who reject it with serious and well-founded objections, both for historical and iconographic reasons, which make the actual possibility of the Mandylion being of a size that it could be identified as the Shroud very remote, since most sources describe it as a small cloth.
[Zaccone, La Sindone. Storia di una immagine, p. 60]
Zaccone also points out that “hypotheses that seek to equate these two images" (the Mandylion and the Shroud) are "at this time, not really viable” [Id., Dalle acheropite alla Sindone, in A. Monaci Castagno (edited by), Sacre impronte e oggetti "non fatti da mano d'uomo" nelle religioni. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Torino, 18-20 maggio 2010, Edizioni dell'Orso, 2011, p. 320].
Abandoning this hypothesis, however, would mean having to accept that the Shroud appears out of nowhere in the 14th century, or (as a minority of sindonologists do) looking for alternative hypotheses, which from an historiographical point of view, however, are even more inconsistent, as we shall see.
This explains why most sindologists have vigorously sought confirmation of the Mandylion-Shroud identification theory.
Let's analyze the main paths taken.
Blood on the Face?
In 944, the Holy Face of Edessa wass transferred to Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine empire, and ultimately placed in the imperial chapel of the Virgin of the Pharos.
A new version of the story concerning its origins then spread, known to us through the text of a homily given on that occasion by the Archdeacon of St. Sophia, Gregory Referendarius (who claimed to have learned of this version from Syriac texts he personally found in Edessa): Jesus, "undergoing the passion of his own free will, [...] wiped the sweat that was running down his face like drops of blood in his agony” [The Sermon of Gregory Referendarius, in M. Guscin, The Image of Edessa, Brill, 2009, p. 77].
The reference is clearly to the sweat mixed with blood that, according to the Gospel of Luke (22:44), Jesus dripped in Gethsemane before being arrested by the Temple guards. As such was miraculously born the Mandylion, according to this new version of the story.
Sindonologist Mark Guscin, a classicist and independent researcher, writes:
Gregory places the moment of the imprint directly in the passion of Christ, during the prayer and agony in Gethsemane. This could very well have been an attempt to explain the presence of bloodstains on the cloth.
[Guscin, The Tradition of the Image of Edessa, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2016, p. 53]
This interpretation appears entirely plausible at first glance but is hopelessly contradicted by several objective findings.
I’ll put forth some of my own considerations here.
First, let's recall that none of the preserved sources prior to Gregory's homily mention blood on the face of the Mandylion. All placed the miraculous formation of the Image at an unspecified time in Jesus' public life or in Jerusalem, yet before the Passion (of which the Gethsemane incident constitutes the beginning).
This is inconsistent with the assumption that blood was visible on the face.
It’s true that in Edessa, in order to increase the sacredness of the Image, ordinary worshippers were not allowed to see it up close. But, in fact, it was very famous and revered, as well as the subject of homilies and sermons, and it’s not really plausible that for centuries its nature as a relic of the Passion had not transpired, if it indeed did have such a nature.
Let’s assume, however, that things are as the sindologists say. In 944, therefore, Gregory Referendaruis implicitly revealed that the image depicted a bloodied face.
Then why is it that in the following centuries, until the end of the Middle Ages, we don’t find a single copy or one of the many artistic reproductions of the Mandylion featuring the bloodied face of Christ?
Two probable early medieval copies are preserved in Genoa (in the church of St. Bartholomew of the Armenians) and in the Vatican (in the Matilde Chapel). Both were presented to the faithful as the authentic Mandylion of Edessa.
The Mandylion of Genoa and the Mandylion of Rome (now in the Vatican).
Confirming that these must be overall faithful copies is one detail.
The Mandylion of Edessa was said to consist of an image that had been glued into a board and “embellished with gold” by Abgar [Acts of Thaddeus, in Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin, Brill, 2014, p. 33]
This is what's also seen in the Mandylions of Rome and Genoa (The latter, however, is painted directly on the board).
The frame of the Genoese version features ten scenes depicting episodes from the legend of the Mandylion of Edessa and also bears the inscription ΤΟ ΑΓΙΟΝ ΜΑΝΔΗΛΙΟΝ (The Holy Mandylion).
Numerous High and Late Middle Ages artistic representations of the Mandylion of Edessa can still be found in the Christian East, from Cyprus to Russia [cf. H. L. Kessler, Il mandylion, in G. Morello, G. Wolf (eds.), Il volto di Cristo, Electa, 2000, pp. 71-89].
The description presented by Georges Gharib, former professor of Icon Theology at the Pontifical Urbanian University in Rome, applies to all of them:
The canonical type of the Mandylion only depicts the Face of Christ, without neck. [...] Any sign of pain or of the Passion is absent, contrary to what can be seen on the so-called “Veronica" known in the West. This excludes its identification with the Shroud of Turin.
[Georges Gharib, Le icone di Cristo. Storia e culto, Città Nuova, 1993, p. 85]
*****
It’s worth noting that in the versions of the legend prior to the homily of Gregory Referendarius, a liquid element was already found, acting as an intermediary means of the miracle: the sweat (without blood) or water on the face, which Jesus allegedly wiped off with the fabric of the Mandylion.
Such is the case with the Acts of Thaddeus (7th-8th centuries):
Having washed himself, He [Jesus] wiped [or: took an impression of His face [or: aspect]. Having His image remained imprinted on the cloth, He gave it to Ananias.
[Acts of Thaddeus, in Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin, p. 33; cf. Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder, Leipzig, 1899, p. 182*]
In the so-called Letter of the Three Patriarchs, generally considered to be from the 9th-10th centuries, only the sweat is mentioned:
Having wiped off with it [the handkerchief] the sweat of his undefiled face, hereafter he imprinted in it the features of his holy form.
[Letter of the Three Patriarchs, in Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin, p. 48; cfr. Dobschütz, p. 200*]
In the Narratio de imagine Edessena, a Greek text attributed to Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, written shortly after the transfer of the Holy Face to Constantinople, two versions can be found. One coincides with that of Gregory Referendarius (sweat-like blood in Gethsemane), while the other sounds like this:
The Saviour washed his face in water and wiped the liquid from it onto a cloth that he had been handed, and arranged in a divine way beyond understanding for his own likeness to be imprinted upon the cloth.
[Narratio de imagine Edessena, in Guscin, The Image of Edessa, p. 21]
Well, if bloodstains had been discovered on the face of the Mandylion in Constantinople, would there have also been reference to a version with a water-imprinted image?
Moreover, after the writing of Gregory's homily and the Narratio, Eastern Church texts would no longer offer references to blood in relation to the Mandylion.
The Synaxarion of Constantinople (a collection of hagiographic briefs for liturgical use) resumes only the water version, with no relation to the Passion ("after washing he wiped his undefiled and divine face with it. His divine form and aspect was imprinted onto the linen cloth... [Synaxarion, in Guscin, The Image of Edessa, p. 95; cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, cit., p. 48**]).
Later, at the end of the 12th century, in his Didaskalia, theologian Constantine Stilbes, a teacher at the Patriarchal School of Constantinople, also reports only the water version:
[Jesus] asks for water and sprinkles his face with it. He [...] who had also used water at Cana and at the Siloam Pool for the blind man, here once again intimately appropriated this element. He, its creator. He uses a cloth to dry himself and (miracle!) materially imprints upon it a form not made by human hand...
[Bernard Flusin, Didascalie de Constantin Stilbès sur le mandylion et la sainte tuile (BHG 796m), "Revue des études byzantines", 1997, 55, pp. 72-75]
From all that's been said thus far, it’s apparent that in the stories mentioned above, water, sweat and blood do not create stains that reproduce their essence but have sacred value, like water, oil and wine in the Catholic liturgy or like the saliva with which Jesus, in the Gospels, heals the blind, deaf and dumb [Mark 7:33, 8:23; John 9:6].
The importance of the liquid element as an intermediary of the miracle is explicitly emphasized in the Narratio de imagine Edessena:
The form of a face could be imparted onto the linen cloth from a moist secretion with no paint or artistic craft...
[Narratio de imagine Edessena, in Guscin, The Image of Edessa, p. 11]
Evidently, after versions had spread that assigned a central role to the water that had been in contact with Jesus' body or the sweat he emitted, the continuous renewal of the legend had led, in the version reported by Gregory, to make a connection (which, moreover, has remained negligible and secondary in tradition) with the only passage in which the Gospel itself makes explicit reference to Jesus' sweat.
The fact that blood is also mentioned in that Gospel passage therefore does not mean that Gregory is saying that the face of the image was bloodied.
Blood from the Side?
Let’s stay focused on the homily delivered in 944 by Gregory Referendarius
Sindologists who support the identification of the Shroud as the Mandylion, translating in a certain way the Greek text of this inflated sermon (as is typical in the Byzantine style), claim that at one point Gregory refers to the Mandylion as a burial cloth on which the body of Jesus is depicted with the wound in his side (inflicted upon him, according to the Gospel of John [19:34], while he was on the cross but already dead).
In their view, this would prove that it was discovered in Constantinople not only that the Mandylion was bloodstained but also that it depicted the body of Jesus (although no source provides news of this alleged sensational discovery).
The following is the translation of the passage in question commonly presented in sindological publications.
It begins with a reference to the splendor of the face on the Mandylion (formed, as we said, according to Gregory's own account, in Gethsemane):
The splendor, on the other hand, - and may each one be inspired by this narrative - has been imprinted
only by the drops of agonizing sweat of the face of the prince of life, which are dropped as bloodstains, and
by the finger of God. These are the beauties that colored the imprint which is really of Christ, for...
[Alfonso Caccese, Emanuela Marinelli, Laura Provera, Domenico Repice, Il Mandylion a Costantinopoli, in E. Marinelli (editer by), Nuova luce sulla Sindone, Ares, 2024, p. 97.
The article, which we will refer to again and again as an expression of the most widespread and popularized views of sindology from a historical-philological perspective, was presented at the International Conference on the Shroud of Turin held in 2017 in Pasco, Washington, USA, and is also available in its entirety in an online version.]
Pay close attention as we're coming to the most important point.
It all revolves around a Greek expression (...ὅτι καὶ τὸ ἀφ'οὗ κατεσταλάχθησαν ῥανίσι πλευρᾶς ἰδίας ἐγκεκαλλώπισται), which sindologists translate, adding explanatory notes in parentheses:
...for also this – that image he mentioned earlier, the τὸ ἐκμαγεῖον (tò ekmaghéion), resumed from the
only article τὸ (tò) - from when they (the drops) oozed, is embellished by the drops of his own side.
[Ibid., p. 98]
They comment:
The text presents the imprint of the body as a temporal consequence of the sweat of blood which
has imprinted on the face and, at the same time, in close relation to that, because it is the same image
that was “embellished” also of drops (of blood ) of the side.
[Ibid.]
According to them, “on the Edessa Image not only was the face visible, but also the chest at least up to the
height of the side. The text does not question the identity of what is imprinted on the cloth” [ibid., p. 97].
In reality, it’s precisely the sindologists’ translation which poses many problems, both logical and linguistic.
According to sindologists, Gregory recounted that on the nights between Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week, Jesus, in Gethsemane, wiped his face with the same large cloth that, three days later, on Friday, would be used as his burial cloth (thus, in Gregory's words, the image would be completed in two steps).
This interpretation of the text (originally formulated in the late 1980s by sindologist Gino Zaninotto, a professor of Catholic Religion, graduate of Humanities and passionate independent researcher of history and philology) has been rejected even by scholars inclined to believe in the Shroud's authenticity, such as the aforementioned Mark Guscin, because it "cannot be supported either from the Greek text or from the internal logic of the text" [Guscin, The Image of Edessa, p. 208].
As we have seen, sindologists translate the Greek article τὸ as "it" (with recall function to the previously mentioned image).
Anyone who’s studied Greek knows that, beyond correlative and crystallized expressions that don’t interest us here, in this language, the article, when recalling previously mentioned things or persons (assuming anaphoric pronominal function), is followed by the particle δέ and is typically found at the beginning of syntactically autonomous propositions [cf. N. Basile, Sintassi storica del greco antico, Levante, 2001, pp. 77-79]. None of these conditions are met in the passage in question.
For any Greek scholar, and even for any high-achieving high school student studying Greek, the most obvious and natural translation of the expression τὸ ἀφ'οὗ κατεσταλάχθησαν is “that from which they dripped…” (not “it from when they had dripped...).
For the sake of clarity, I quote the entire passage in Mark Guscin’s translation:
This reflection, however - may everyone be inspired with the explanation - has been imprinted only by the sweat from the face of the ruler of life, falling like drops of blood, and by the finger of God. For these are indeed the beauties that have coloured the true imprint of Christ, because that from which they dripped was also embellished by drops from his own side.
[Gregory Referendarius, Sermon, in Guscin, The Image of Edessa, p. 85; cf. Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin, p. 58]
The Imagined Image
Sindologists, in their discussion at the International Conference on the Shroud of Turin del 2017, state:
In the text Life of St. Alexis, that possibly dates back to the 9th century, the Edessa Image is defined “bloodied”.
[Caccese, Marinelli, Provera, Repice, p. 85]
The information is inaccurate, but it has been circulating in sindological writings at the highest levels for a quarter of a century, and no one has ever explicitly corrected it.
The authors refer (note 124) to another paper, presented back in 2000 at the World Congress on the Shroud by sindologist Gino Zaninotto.
As a matter of fact, going by what Zaninotto states, it reads:
Already in the Life of St. Alexis (800?) the image of Edessa is referred to as sanguinea [Latin for "bloodied", MC]: "In qua sanguinea domini serva<ba>tur ymago" (DOBSCHÜTZ, p. 196*).
[Gino Zaninotto, La Sindone/Mandylion nel silenzio di Costantinopoli (944-1242), in Sindone 2000. Congresso mondiale: Orvieto, Agosto 27-28-29, 2000. Atti, Gerni, 2002, p. 466, n. 8]
Zaninotto, however, misinterpreted what Dobschütz wrote.
The latter, on the page Zaninotto refers to, wrote:
800 ca. (?) Life of Alexis, Man of God.
[Dobschütz, Christusbilder, cit., p. 196*]
Immediately after, Dobschütz lists seven Life sources that refer to the Image of Edessa, including, as number three, the one (and only one) that actually calls it “sanguinea”:
c) Latin poem from the Codex Monac. Aug. S. Url. 111, Massmann p. 176
hinc iter arripiens Edisse <venit> in urbem
in qua sanguinea domini serva<ba>tur ymago
[Ibid.; the abbreviations stand for Monacensis, Augsburg, Sankt Ulrich]
As we see, Dobschütz explicitly refers to philologist Hans Ferdinand Massmann who, on page 176 of his study on the sources of the Life of St. Alexis (Appendix D), publishes the poem.
If, however, one goes to see what Massmann says when describing the various sources he published (in Latin, Greek and German) regarding the text we're interested in, we read:
We have included a third poem in hexameter (unfortunately, incomplete) in the appendix, under D, from Cod. Monac. Aug. S. Ulr. 111 (ex cod. 141), 4th ch., 14th century (ff. 93a [recto] - 96b [verso]).
[Hans Ferdinand Massmann, Sanct Alexius Leben, Basse, Quedlinburg 1843, p. 29]
The codex is therefore from the 14th century; not the 9th. In 2016, Guscin writes correctly:
In the fourteenth-century Latin verse version of the Life of St. Alexius we read the following lines:
hinc iter arripiens Edisse (venit) in urbem
in qua sanguinea domini serva(ba)tur ymago
[Guscin, The Tradition of the Image of Edessa, p. 116; in the relevant note (n° 23) the author writes: "Massmann, Sanct Alexius, 176-179, from cod. Monacensis Aug. S. Ulr. 111."]
Guscin, however, does not point out the error circulating in sindological circles.
Zaninotto did not understand that when Dobschütz wrote “c. 800 (?)”, he referred to the origin of the narrative strand on the life of St. Alexis but did not also referred to the seven sources he later indicated. Suffice it to say that among them is a poem by Konrad von Würzburg, who lived in the 13th century.
g) Konrad von Würzburg, S. Alexius 266-273 in Massmann 90
[Dobschütz, Christusbilder, cit., p. 197*]
*****
Zaninotto's mistake itself is not the problem. We all make mistakes.
The fact is, precisely because individuals make mistakes, any discipline that is scientific is based on self-regulatory processes, so in critical confrontation, errors made are identified, corrected and thus eliminated by other members of the insider community.
Here, we are faced with an objectively erroneous bit of information disseminated in 2000 at a world congress, presented again as such in 2017 at an international congress and finally, republished in 2024 by Italy's best-known sindologist.
All this would be unthinkable in any scientific field and can only happen if that community of insiders is not sufficiently inclined to critical debate.
Having clarified this, let's return to our 14th-century source.
Guscin continues to think there may be some weight in support of the claim that the Mandylion can be linked to the Passion, but he neglects an underlying detail. If there had been blood on the Mandylion, would not be a minor fact to be discovered by sifting through isolated late sources, perhaps forcing their interpretation.
In particular, how much weight can a source have, written far from the places where the Mandylion had been preserved for centuries and at a time when no one knows for sure what had become of it (it, in fact, disappears from Constantinople during the 13th century)?
It’s obvious that the poet is talking about an image he has never seen.
Not surprisingly, apologist Fr. André-Marie Dubarle, while devoting a paragraph to the Legend of St. Alexis in his book on the alleged “ancient history” of the Shroud (A.-M. Dubarle, Histoire ancienne du linceul de Turin, O.E.I.L., 1985, pp. 84-85), being well acquainted with Dobschütz's text and adhering to the Mandylion-Syndon identification thesis, makes no reference at all to the late variant of the Codex Monacensis and the “bloodied” image.
But there’s still more to say.
It’s a well-known fact (and several sources could be cited) that in the West, the Mandylion was often confused with the Veil of Veronica.
Guscin himself notes that "the two images were often confused in both literature and art" [Guscin, The Tradition of the Image of Edessa, p. 192].
As we know, the Veil of Veronica was, by the 12th century, related to the ascent to Calvary (see: Images Not Made by Human Hand?).
From the late Middle Ages, the image of Veronica wiping the face of Jesus carrying the cross is present in the sixth station of the Stations of the Cross, and in artistic depictions of Veronica (which begin to spread from the 13th century), the face of Jesus often appears bloodied [cf. G. Wolf, "Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra?” Sguardi alla "vera icona" e alle sue copie artistiche, in Morello, Wolf, pp. 103-114].
All of this abundantly explains why a 14th-century Latin codex may, in contrast to an innumerable amount of written and iconographic sources, have called the image of the Mandylion “bloodied".
“The Form of My Whole Body...”
A small number of sources, however, actually describe the Mandylion as a cloth reproducing the entire image of Jesus.
Sindologists naturally leverage this as well.
I offer here the most significant example of the argument in question. However, the critical observations I will make apply to all the similar (but few) cases found by sindologists:
A strong testimony in favor of the identification of the Edessa Image with the Shroud was discovered by historian Gino Zaninotto: the Codex Vossianus Latinus Q 69 ff. 6r-6v, preserved in the
Rijksuniversiteit ofLeiden (Netherlands). It is a 10th-century manuscript that refers to a prior original
Syrian text that dates back to before the 8th century, a period in which it was translated into Latin by the archiater Smira.
[Caccese, Marinelli, Provera, Repice, p. 86]
Codex Vossianus Latinus Q 69 is a 10th-11th century source containing an anonymous account that Jesus, in his legendary letter to Abgar, recipient of the gift of the Mandylion, promised to send him a fabric depicting his entire body (the story had already been published by Dobschütz which, however, had been based on more recent codices from the 12th century).
The source we’re talking about is a sermon that, in its heading (Tractatus ex libro Syrorum tranlatus in latinum a domno Smera archiatrali), is presented as the Latin translation of a Syriac original that, however, we have not received and therefore, we can’t say anything regarding its content.
The only thing we know for sure is that the story is an obvious reworking of a Latin version dating back to 769.
An accurate comparison between the two sources was published by Dobschütz in Christusbilder (pp. 137**-138**).
According to the source dating from 769, Jesus wrote to Abgar: “If you wish to physically see my face, behold, I send you the image of my transfigured face on a linen.”
Instead, in the Codex Vossianus, we read that Jesus is said to have written to Abgar:
«If you wish to look at my appearance as it is physically, I send you this sheet on which you will be able
to see not only my face portrayed, but you will be able to look at the form of my whole body divinely
transfigured».
The text continues further on and states:
The mediator between God and men, in order to completely satisfy the king, laid down with the whole
body on a sheet as white as snow. And then happened something wonderful to see and to hear. The glorious
image of the face of the Lord, as well as the most noble form of His body, to divine virtue, transformed
suddenly on the sheet.
[Caccese, Marinelli, Provera, Repice, p. 86]
Sindologist Father Dubarle observes: “In the sermon text, therefore, there has been an interpolation after 769, as can be legitimately deduced from the comparison of the two texts” [Dubarle, p. 60].
Everyone can agree that what's reported in Codex Vossianus is a legendary tale, but if one wants to think that it originated on the basis of the alleged discovery of the “true” nature of the Mandylion (coinciding with the Shroud) which took place in Constantinople, this thesis is contradicted by the available factual data.
In fact, although the source defines the Mandylion as a cloth reproducing the entire body of Jesus, it nevertheless presents a narrative that’s irreconcilable with the visually evident features of the Shroud (especially, one might say, with those that would have been evident at the time, had the Shroud already existed. Based on the available evidence, one can infer that with the passage of time, the image became increasingly less perceptible due to the degradation of the fabric, which is naturally subject to yellowing by oxidation).
The earliest detailed descriptions of the Shroud date from the 1400s (and particularly the 1500s) and confirm the evidence of signs reproducing wounds.
Count Antoine de Lalaing, who witnessed the display of the Shroud that took place in 1503 in Bourg-en-Bresse, wrote:
You can see it clearly stained with the most precious blood of Jesus, as if it were done today.
[M. Gachard (edited by), Collection des voyages des souverains des Pays-Bas. Tome premier, Hayez, Bruxelles 1876, p. 286]
Antonio de Beatis, secretary of cardinal Louis of Aragon, saw the Shroud in Chambéry in 1518 and wrote:
You can see evidence of the blows very clearly: the ropes that bound the hands, the crown around the forehead, the nails on the hands and feet and especially the wound in the side.
[Antonio de Beatis, Voyage du cardinal d'Aragon en Allemagne, Hollande, Belgique, France et Italie (1517-1518), Perrin, Parigi 1913, p. 210]
In 1534, the Poor Clares charged with mending the Shroud, damaged by a fire that broke out in 1532 in the chapel of Chambéry, wrote a report that read, for example:
On this precious canvas, we saw sufferings that one could never know. We even saw the traces of a face entirely battered and bruised by blows, his divine head pierced with large thorns, from which rivers of blood flowed...
[Léon Bouchage, Le Saint Suaire de Chambéry à Sainte-Claire-en-Ville (avril-mai 1534), Drivet, Chambéry 1891, p. 21]
Similar observations can be found in a letter written on June 21, 1582, by Cardinal Carlo Borromeo to the initiates of the college of Santa Maria di Monza [Montre-nous ton visage, n. 2, 1989, pp. 29 e ss.](Montre-nous ton visage, n. 2, 1989, pp. 29 et seq.)
In 1599, Archbishop Alfonso Paleotti of Bologna published what would be the first book on the Shroud, containing a description of all the wounds visible on the image. In it, we read:
As the Lord's head was covered in blood, its flow soaked the sacred hair that, as can be understood from the marks seen in the Holy Shroud, lost its original color.
[Alfonso Paleotti, Esplicatione del sacro lenzuolo ove fu involto il Signore et delle piaghe in esso impresse, Heredi di Gio. Rossi, Bologna 1599, p. 68]
In short, the account from the Vossianus Codex has nothing to do with the Shroud and its wounds, which clearly refer to the idea of flagellation (and moreover has nothing to do with a double frontal/dorsal image).
The fact is that a legendary tale, like that of the Mandylion, can spread, evolve and be magnified anywhere even though (if not especially since) no one has ever seen the relic from the story.
It's worth recalling that there isn't even a depiction of the Mandylion presenting it as full-length.
And yet in the 11th and 12th centuries, among the testimonies of those who were personally in Constantinople, if they haven’t seen the Mandylion, at least they report what was said about it there. There’s not even one that describes it as depicting anything other than the face of Jesus.
A description of Constantinople by an anonymous author, most likely written at the end of the 11th century reads:
This most precious linen honored through contact with the face of the Lord Jesus is preserved with greater veneration than the other relics in the palace and held in such high regard that it's always kept in a gold vessel locked with the utmost care.
[Krijnie N. Ciggaar, Une description de Constantinople dans le Tarragonensis 55, in Revue des études byzantines, 53, 1995, p. 120]
Around 1150, an English pilgrim noted:
These are the relics that are shown in Constantinople, in the emperor's chapel: [...] the Mantile [Mandylion] which, upon contact with the face of the Lord, preserved its image.
[Paul Riant, Exuviae sacrae Constantinopolitanae, t. II, Ginevra, 1878, pp. 211-212]
Around 1190, another anonymous text reports the presence in Constantinople of the “holy towel on which the face of Christ is depicted, sent by Jesus Christ to Abgar, king of the city of Edessa” [Dubarle, p. 53].
Later, as we know, the Mandylion disappeared from Constantinople.
*****
It’s important to add that a second version of the Veronica legend relative to its intermediate stage of development (and therefore, still unrelated to the Passion) reports that the image given by Jesus to the bleeding woman “healed the emperor through contact with the entire body” [Dobschütz, p. 281*].
It was therefore a version that presented the Veil of Veronica as an image of the entire body of Jesus.
From a strictly logical and chronological point of view, an inverse process to one proposed by sindology cannot be ruled out: the existence of sub-strands that arose in the High Middle Ages (pertaining to both the Mandylion and the Veronica) according to which, there was a full-body acheropite image of Jesus which could, in theory, have provided the impetus for the creation of a burial cloth such as the Shroud.
The shrouds of Saint Mary of the Pharos and the Mandylion
Many sindologists also continue to refer to a speech given in 1201 by the sacristan in charge of the keeping of the many alleged relics preserved in the imperial chapel of Saint Mary of the Pharos in Constantinople:
In 1201 Nicholas Mesarites, custodian of the relics preserved in the chapel of St. Mary of the
Pharos, had to defend them against the looters by remembering the seditious the sanctity of the place,
wheὄe, among other things, the soudárion with the funeral cloths were kept. “They - Mesarites
underlines - still have the perfume, they defy corruption, because they have wrapped the ineffable
dead, naked and embalmed after the Passion”. It is logical to conclude by mentioning the naked body,
Mesarites was referring to the image of the whole body of the Savior on a sheet.
[Caccese, Marinelli, Provera, Repice, p. 93]
That's not logical.
Mesarites is discussing the ten most important alleged relics of the Passion housed in the chapel and as number four he mentions the cloths, calling them entaphioi sindones [ἐντάφιοι σινδόνες], i.e., burial shrouds. Beyond the generic name, no objective element causes them to coincide with that which later becomes the quintessential Shroud.
To put this into context, keep in mind that immediately after, in fifth place, Nicholas Mesaritea cites a towel that miraculously “remains wet to this day, having dried the glorious feet of the apostles...” [A. Heisenberg (ed.), Die Palastrevolution des Johannes Komnenos, K. Universitäts-Druckerei von H. Stürtz, 1907, p. 30].
But let's continue on:
Speaking to the rebellious, after having enumerated ten of the most precious relics, Mesarites continues: “But now I put in front of your eyes the Legislator faithfully portrayed on a towel and sculpted in a fragile clay with such an art of drawing that we can see that this does not come from human hands.”
[Caccese, Marinelli, Provera, Repice, p. 93]
Undoubtedly, Mesarites is referring here to the Mandylion (and to the Keramion, i.e., one of the tiles upon which, according to a later version of the legend that was first mentioned in the Narratio de Imagine Edessena - the Mandylion miraculously transmitted its image). However, he is distinguishing the Mandylion from the “shrouds” mentioned earlier.
This was noted as early as 1992 by Odile Celier of the Institut Catholique (Catholic University) de Paris:
Mandylion and burial textiles are, in this 1201 text, quite different objects. This distinction on the part of Nicholas Mesarites somewhat contradicts the thesis of the identity of these relics that some Shroud experts are now looking to support.
[Odile Celier, Le signe du linceul. La Saint Suaire de Turin : de la relique à l'image, Cerf, 1992, p. 39]
A Tetradiplon Fabric
In the Acts of Thaddeus (7th-8th century) and other versions of the legend derived from them, the Mandylion is referred to as a tetradiplon (τετράδιπλον).
This is a word that has no other occurrence in ancient and medieval Greek but is recorded in modern Greek dictionaries with the meaning of “folded into four”.
Ian Wilson believes that this word confirms his theory (upon which, as we have seen, much of current sindology is historically based).
According to Wilson (and the sindologists who refer to him) the word tetradiplon would substantiate that the cloth was stored folded in such a way that only the upper part of the image was visible and, with the addition of a frame that hid the shoulders and neck, only the face remained in view.
In this way, the Shroud would have looked like the Mandylion as depicted in the numerous artistic depictions scattered throughout the churches of the Christian East from the 11th-12th centuries onward: a face in the center of a cloth, usually rectangular.
This would prove that Shroud and Mandylion are the same thing.
Mandylion, Sakli Church, Göreme (Turkey).
Here, we read from the Encyclopedia of Medieval Art (1991) regarding depictions of the Mandylion:
After legends related to mandilium were introduced into the liturgy, some representations appeared in the 11th century, first in manuscripts, then in icons and large-scale paintings. [...] These holy faces are traditionally composed upon a backdrop of simulated fabric, from which, however, the fringes quickly disappeared, and in later works, the fabric appears knotted at the edges. Similar images appear from the 12th century onward in wall paintings. In Cappadocia, four examples can be found in the churches of Göreme...
[Acheropita, in Enciclopedia Treccani Online]
In essence, those which — according to sindologists — would be artistic representations of the Mandylion-Syndon, folded in such as way as to show only the face (devoid of blood), become widespread just after, according to the theses of these same sindologists, it would begin to be discovered that the body of Christ was also represented (bloodied, beginning with the face). This is no small contradiction.
But we’ll continue to examine Wilson’s thesis.
He writes in an apparently correct manner that the Acts of Thaddeus “describe the cloth on which the Image was imprinted as tetradiplon - 'doubled in four' ” [I. Wilson, The Shroud. The 2000-Year-Old Mystery Solved, Bentam, 2011, p. 190].
Picture taken from Iam Wilson, The Shroud, Bantam, 2011, p. 191.
Folding a sheet into four parts requires folding twice.
Wilson however, illustrates his theory via a process that considers three folds (a, b, c) and leads to actually obtaining eight layers and, surprisingly, defines the cloth in this form as “folded in four”.
He writes:
What happens if we try doubling the Shroud in four? If we take a full-lenght photographic print of the Shroud , double it, then double it twice again, we find the Shroud in eight (or two times four) segments...
[Ibid., pp. 190-191]
If the cloth instead truly folds into four parts, the figure remains visible up to the waist.
Mark Guscin seems to have realized the inconsistency of this thesis as explained by Wilson but believes he can still save it by making assumptions about the meanings that could be given to the term tetradiplon:
At first sight, the word seems easy to understand. It is made up of two elements, the words for "four" (tetra) and "fold over in two" (diplon). However, does this mean folded over in two four times (resulting in sixteen layers), or folded in four so that there were four layers, or eight layers (i.e. four double layers)? [...] It is not a straightforward task to understand the exact meaning of τετράδιπλον. [...]
No matter what exact number of folds is involved in making a cloth τετράδιπλον, it is clear that the use of this word means that the cloth was reasonably large, larger at least than the amount of cloth needed for just a facial image.
[Guscin, The Tradition of the Image of Edessa, pp. 132-133]
In fact, it doesn't seem to be the case at all.
Nicolotti makes an important observation. In the Acts of Thaddeus, “the word τετράδιπλον appears the moment that Jesus wipes his face and not afterward” [Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin, p. 36].
In other words, it doesn’t make sense to see from that adjective that the cloth was stored folded in that way.
But why, in the story, is it said that the cloth was given to Jesus folded like that?
In my opinion, the key to everything is in something that was said in the Middle Ages about the Veil of Veronica.
Let’s recall that Dobschütz, in his groundbreaking study published in 1899, revealed that regarding Veronica, the legendary tradition at one point speaks of a velum triplicatum [Dobschütz, p. 225], i.e., folded (and this is the literal meaning of the Latin perfect participle plicatus) into three layers:
The cloth on which Jesus had imprinted his face was folded three times, and thus three impressions had sprung up simultaneously. In addition to Rome, Jerusalem and Jaén in Spain had the honor of possessing the other originals.
[Ibid.]
One source in Old French from 1390 is Ly myreur des histors by Jean des Preis, in which we read:
And he took the cloth, folded it in three and placed it on his noble face, and so his own face remained imprinted on the three parts of the fabric as if it were he himself.
[Jean des Preis d'Outremeuse, Ly myreur des histors, Hayez, Bruxelles 1864, p. 433]
How does one not relate the Veronica folded into three to the Mandylion folded into four?
During that time in the Middle Ages, when fake relics were manufactured in quantity, legends were commonly created to justify the simultaneous existence of various alleged miraculous copies obtained by “contact” with the original acheropite:
Being generated by contact with the originals gave them equal dignity and virtues similar to the archetypes from which they were derived.
[Emanuela Fogliadini, Il Volto di Cristo. Gli Acheropiti del Salvatore nella Tradizione dell'Oriente cristiano, Jaka Book, 2011, p. 91]
This was the case for the image of Camuliana (see: Images Not Made by Human Hand?), and it was also the case for the Veronica.
Sources tell us of several copies also of the Mandylion (two in Edessa according to the Narratio de Imagine Edessena [Guscin, The Image of Edessa, p. 47], one was in Alexandria, Egypt, around the 7th century [cf. Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin, p. 79, n. 5], and one was presumed to have been obtained miraculously by contact in Constantinople in the 10th century, at the request of St. Paul of Latros [cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, cit., pp. 216-217*]).
Accordingly, the interpretation most consistent with the available factual data is that the reference to the τετράδιπλον cloth implied justification for the simultaneous existence of multiple alleged Faces of Edessa.
An Ancient History for the Shroud, at Any Cost
As we mentioned, there are sindologists who, persuaded of the fragility of the Mandylion-Syndon identification, have since proposed an even more unbelievable thesis.
I refer specifically to three Spanish sindologists who stated at the International Conference on the Turin Shroud, held in Ancaster, Canada in 2019:
We cannot support the hypothesis which identifies the Mandylion and the Shroud as one and the same. This conclusion has led us to look for an alternative view [...].
As a new plausible hypothesis, we have found promising clues in the Icon of Beirut...
[César Barta, Pedro Sabe, José Manuel Orenga, The Beirut Icon and the Holy Shroud, in R. G. Chiang, E. M. White (a cura di), Science, Theology and the Holy Shroud: Edited Papers from the 2019 International Conference on the Turin Shroud, Doorway Publications, 2020, pp. 278-279.
The account of the Beirut image, which we maintain in both Greek and Latin translations, was read at the Second Council of Nicaea, held in the year 787.
It’s a legend with an anti-Semitic tone that’s centered on a painting depicting Jesus. Left behind by a Christian in a house later frequented by Jews, it was allegedly reviled and pierced by them. The painting thus began to bleed.
As the three sindologists write:
Of course, we should not take this legend literally and present it as a historical fact. It is not necessary to believe that the icon was literally nailed, pierced, and that blood and water flowed out because of the mistreatments. The legend simply tries to explain why the image included the whole body, with the blood and the wounds of the crucifixion (highlighting the wound on the side). We point out that this legend describes the icon as a painting of the whole body (integrae staturae) with the wounds of the Passion. Interestingly, it highlights the chest wound but makes no mention of the crown of thorns. In addition, the image had, initially, gone unnoticed by the Jew. Even today, many people need help to recognize the faint image of the Shroud.
[Ibid., p. 281]
First (and this also applies to the Mandylion-Syndon identification), if the Shroud was truly the burial cloth of Jesus, it’s very unlikely that over time, the Christian community had forgotten something so important.
That having been said, the image mentioned in the Beirut legend is “aptly painted” (ἐν σεμνοῖς μὲν ἦν ἐζωγραφημένη/honeste depictam [E. Lamberz (ed.), Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum, Series Secunda, III, 2, De Gruyter, 2012, pp. 318-319; cf. Barta, Sabe, Orenga, p. 280]).
According to one version of the Greek text, instead, the image had been painted “on board”. (ἐν σανίσι: Lamberz, p. 318 [Codex Vaticanus Graecus 836, referred to in the critical apparatus as V])
Neither definition legitimizes identification with the Shroud.
Nowhere in the narrative is it then implied that it was an enormous sheet almost four and a half meters long, depicting the deceased Christ via a frontal and dorsal image.
It speaks of an image forgotten by the Christian (τὴν εικόνα τοῦ κυρίου ἀφῆκε λησμόνησας/imaginem domini dimisit oblivioni [Lamberz, op. cit., pp. 320-321; cfr. Barta, Sabe, Orenga, op. cit., p. 280]) that was, at first, not seen by the Jew as he had not carefully observed that part of the house (μὴ θεωρήσας τὴν εικόνα τοῦ κυρίου ὅτι ἵσταται ἐκεῖ· οὐδὲ γὰρ κατενόησε τὸν τόπον ἐκείνον/minime contemplatus iconam domini quod staret illic neque enim consideravit locum illum [ibid.]). Nowhere in the text does it suggest that the image was faint or difficult to perceive.
Beginning in the 9th century, the image would be identified as a crucifix that Emperor John Zimisce brought as the spoils of war from Beirut to Constantinople [cf. M. Bacci, "Quel bello miracolo onde si fa la festa del santo Salvatore": studio sulle metamorfosi di una leggenda, in G. Rossetti (ed.), Santa Croce e Santo Volto, GISEM - Edizioni ETS, 2002, pp. 12 e 56].
In all of this, there is nothing that can be justifiably and reasonably linked to the Shroud of Turin.
Marco Corvaglia
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