Portal:Catholic Church/Article Archive/August 2007



The Shroud of Turin (or Turin Shroud) is a linen cloth bearing the image of a man who appears to have been physically traumatized in a manner consistent with crucifixion. It is being kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, Italy. The shroud is the subject of intense debate among some scientists, believers, historians, and writers regarding where, when, and how the shroud and its images were created. Some believe it is the cloth that covered Jesus of Nazareth when he was placed in his tomb and that his image was recorded on its fibers at or near the time of his proclaimed resurrection. Skeptics contend the shroud is a medieval hoax or forgery &mdash; or even a devotional work of artistic verisimilitude. Radiocarbon tests in 1988 by three independent teams of scientists yielded results showing that the shroud was created in the Middle Ages and not the first century A.D.

The shroud is rectangular, measuring approximately 4.4 x 1.1 m (14.3 x 3.7 ft). The cloth is woven in a herringbone twill and is composed of flax fibrils entwined with cotton fibrils. It bears the image of a front and dorsal view of a naked man with his hands folded across his groin. The two views are aligned along the midplane of the body and pointing in opposite directions. The front and back views of the head nearly meet at the middle of the cloth. The views are consistent with an orthographic projection of a human body, but see Analysis of the image as the work of an artist.

The "Man of the Shroud" has a beard, moustache, and shoulder-length hair parted in the middle. He is well-proportioned, muscular, and quite tall (1.75 m) for a man of the first century (the time of Jesus' death) or for the Middle Ages (the time of the first uncontested report of the shroud's existence, and the proposed time of possible forgery). Dark, red stains, either blood or a substance meant to be perceived as blood, are found on the cloth, showing various wounds:

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