Arculf: Turin Shroud Encyclopedia

Turin Shroud Encyclopedia
Copyright © Stephen E. Jones[1]

Arculf #11

This is "Arculf," part #11 of my Turin Shroud Encyclopedia. For more information about this series, see part #1 and part #2. Emphases are mine unless otherwise indicated.

[Index #1] [Previous: Antioch #10] [Next: Baima Ballone, P. #12]

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Arculf was a 7th century bishop of Perigueux, France[2]. In about 680

[Right (enlarge)[3]: Location of the Island of Iona.]

[see "680"] Arculf made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land[4], where he lived for nine month[5]. On his return journey Arculf was shipwrecked on the Island of Iona in the Scottish Hebrides[6]. Arculf was given shelter in the island's monastery (later Abbey) by its

[Left (enlarge)[7]: Iona Abbey (13th-15th century), built on the site of the original 6th century monastery.]

abbot, St. Adamnan (c. 624–704)[8].

Arculf related to Adamnan the story of his pilgrimage[9]. Based on what Arculf told him of his travels, Adamnan, with aid from other sources, produced De Locis Sanctis (Concerning Sacred Places), a descriptive work in three books, about Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and other places in Palestine, as well as Alexandria and Constantinople[10].

From Arculf's description of Jerusalem, Adamnan produced in his De Locis Sanctis a map of Jerusalem [Right (enlarge)[11]] which for 11 centuries was the oldest known map of Jerusalem until the discovery of the Madaba Map in 1884[12]. Also, from Arculf's description of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Adamnan also included in De Locis Sanctis a floor plan of the Church[13] [Above (enlarge)[14]].

Arculf reported seeing in Jerusalem the column to which Jesus had been bound during the scourging (Mt 27:26; Mk 15:15; Lk 23:16 & Jn 19:1), the cup from which Jesus drank the Last Supper (Mt 26:26-28; Mk 14:22-24; Lk 22:17-20; 1Cor 11:23-26) and the lance which pierced Jesus' side (Jn 19:31-34)[15]; and in Constantinople the three major pieces of the True Cross, the crossbeam and the vertical bar in two pieces[16].

Arculfus also related to Adamnan that in Jerusalem he had seen "the sudarium of Our Lord which was placed over his head in the tomb"[17]. Pro-Shroud writers on this topic have all (as far as I am aware) assumed that Arculfus was referring to the Shroud, even though he says the cloth was "eight feet" long[18], about half the length of the fourteen-foot Shroud[19], and Arculf did not mention this cloth bearing an image[20], which he surely would have if it did[21]. It cannot have been the Shroud folded in two[22], because Arculf actually kissed it[23] and he could not have failed to notice up that close that the sudarium was folded in two and so was twice eight feet long.

While eight feet may seem too long for a face cloth[24], the Greek soudarion "face cloth" (Jn 20:7) is a loan word from the Latin "sudarium": "towel," "napkin"[25] and so could have applied to a cloth eight foot long, but not to one fourteen foot long.

Because Latin originally had no word of its own for the Greek sindon ("shroud") of the synoptic gospels (Mt 27:59; Mk 15:46; Lk 23:53), it was often used in Latin writings to mean the larger cloth that covered Jesus' body[26]. But in the Vulgate, the 4th century Latin translation of the Bible by St. Jerome (c. 342-347), the sudarium is the face cloth (Jn 20:7)[27], and the Shroud is sindone (Mt 27:59; Mk 15:46 & Lk 23:53). Bishop Arculf and Abbot Adamnan would surely have been aware of the Vulgate's distinction between the sindone in which Jesus' "body" was "wrapped (Mt 27:59; Mk 15:46 & Lk 23:53) and the sudarium that had been "about Jesus' head" (Jn 20:7). So when Arculf told Adamnan that he had seen in Jerusalem the sudarium, they both would have understood it to have been the face cloth, not the Shroud.

Finally, the account of the origin of this "sudarium" given to Arculf in Jerusalem shows that it was neither the Shroud of Mt 27:59; Mk 15:46 & Lk 23:53, i.e. the Shroud of Turin, nor the face cloth of Jn 20:7, i.e. the Sudarium of Oviedo, but merely a cloth that had acquired a local legendary status:

"A certain trustworthy believing Jew, immediately after the Resurrection of the Lord, stole from His Sepulchre the sacred linen cloth and hid it in his house for many days; but, by the favour of the Lord Himself, it was found after the lapse of many years, and was brought to the notice of the whole people about three years before [this statement was made to Arculf]"[28]!

Notes
1. This post is copyright. I grant permission to quote from any part of this post (but not the whole post), provided it includes a reference citing my name, its subject heading, its date and a hyperlink back to this page. [return]
2. Beecher, P.A., 1928, "The Holy Shroud: Reply to the Rev. Herbert Thurston, S.J.," M.H. Gill & Son: Dublin, p.143; Wilson, I., 1979, "The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Cloth of Jesus?," [1978], Image Books: New York NY, Revised edition, p.94; Wilson, I., 2010, "The Shroud: The 2000-Year-Old Mystery Solved," Bantam Press: London, pp.109, 147. [return]
3. Extract from "Island of Iona," Google Maps, 2020. [return]
4. Scavone, D.C., 1989, "The Shroud of Turin: Opposing Viewpoints," Greenhaven Press: San Diego CA, p.76; Wilson, 2010, p.109; "Arculf," Wikipedia, 25 January 2020. [return]
5. Beecher, 1928, p.143. [return]
6. Beecher, 1928, p.143; Wilson, 1979, p.94; Wilson, 2010, pp.109, 147; "Arculf," Wikipedia, 25 January 2020. [return]
7. "File:Abbey on the Isle of Iona - geograph.org.uk - 1459438.jpg," Wikimedia Commons, 16 August 2020. [return]
8. Beecher, 1928, p.143; Wilson, 1979, p.94; Wilson, 2010, pp.109, 147; "Arculf," Wikipedia, 25 January 2020. [return]
9. Wilson, 1979, p.94; "Arculf," Wikipedia, 25 January 2020. [return]
10. "De locis sanctis," Wikipedia, 21 May 2020. [return]
11. "File: Arculf De Locis Sanctis Jerusalem.jpg," Wikimedia Commons, 10 November 2019. [return]
12. "Arculf Map of Jerusalem," Wikipedia, 21 May 2020. [return]
13. "Church of the Holy Sepulchre: Crusader period (1099–1244)," Wikipedia, 28 October 2020. [return]
14. "File: Rotunda, Adomanan de locis santis.jpg," Wikimedia Commons, 6 October 2020. [return]
15. Ruffin, C.B., 1999, "The Shroud of Turin: The Most Up-To-Date Analysis of All the Facts Regarding the Church's Controversial Relic," Our Sunday Visitor: Huntington IN, p.54. [return]
16. Bennett, J., 2001, "Sacred Blood, Sacred Image: The Sudarium of Oviedo: New Evidence for the Authenticity of the Shroud of Turin," Ignatius Press: San Francisco CA, p.194. [return]
17. Wilson, 2010, p.109. [return]
18. Beecher, 1928, p.144; Barnes, A.S., 1934, "The Holy Shroud of Turin," Burns Oates & Washbourne: London, p.51; Currer-Briggs, N., 1984, "The Holy Grail and the Shroud of Christ: The Quest Renewed," ARA Publications: Maulden UK, p.16; Currer-Briggs, 1988, p.62; Wilson, I., 1986, "The Evidence of the Shroud," Guild Publishing: London, p.103; Bennett, 2001, p.194. [return]
19. Beecher, 1928, p.144; Currer-Briggs, 1984, p.16; Currer-Briggs, 1988, p.62; Scavone, 1989, p.77. [return]
20. Wilson, 1986, p.103; Scavone, 1989, p.77. [return]
21. Wilson, 1979, p.94. [return]
22. Beecher, 1928, p.144; Ricci, G., "Historical, Medical and Physical Study of the Holy Shroud," in Stevenson, K.E., ed., 1977, "Proceedings of the 1977 United States Conference of Research on The Shroud of Turin," Holy Shroud Guild: Bronx NY, pp.58-73, 59; Currer-Briggs, 1984, p.16; Currer-Briggs, 1988, p.62; Scavone, 1989, p.77. [return]
23. Beecher, 1928, p.144; Wilson, 1979, p.94; Ricci, G., 1981, "The Holy Shroud," Center for the Study of the Passion of Christ and the Holy Shroud: Milwaukee WI, pp.xxxi-xxxii; Scavone, 1989, p.77. [return]
24. Beecher, 1928, p.144. [return]
25. Guscin, 1998, p.11; Bennett, 2001, p.146. [return]
26. Guscin, M., 1998, "The Oviedo Cloth," Lutterworth Press: Cambridge UK, p.11. [return]
27. Guscin, 1998, p.11. [return]
28. Macpherson, J.R., 1895, "Pilgrimage of Arculfus in the Holy Land About the Year A.D. 670," London. No longer online. [return]

Posted: 27 October 2020. Updated: 15 May 2021.

Selvedges: The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Sheet of Jesus! #19

The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Sheet of Jesus!
SELVEDGES
© Stephen E. Jones[1]

This is "Selvedges," part #19 of my online book, "The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Sheet of Jesus!" For more information see the Cover #1, Contents #2 and Preface #3, of this series. See also 11Sep15.

[Contents #2] [Previous: Colour #11] [Next: Sidestrip #20]

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2. A linen cloth #10
3. Selvedges #19

A selvedge is a weaver finished edge at the long sides of a woven cloth

[Above[2]: Bottom right corner of the Shroud (with the frontal image in the lower half and the man upright), showing a section of the right side (apparent left because of mirror-reversal[3]) selvedge and the bottom edge hem.]

as it grows lengthwise on a loom[4]. The weaver binds the raw long edges of the lengthening cloth on the loom to prevent it from unravelling or fraying[5]. Only the two long edges of the Shroud have a selvedge[6].

The coarse linen Holland cloth backing attached to the Shroud by Chambéry's Poor Clare nuns in 1534[7] and the blue satin surround sewed on by Princess Clotilde of Savoy (1843-1911) in 1868[8], had prevented photographs a thorough examination and of the Shroud's edges[9]. That was until 1978 when during the Shroud of Turin Research Project (STURP)'s examination, Turin microanalyst Giovanni Riggi (1935-2008), unpicked a section of the backing cloth to view the man's image from the Shroud's underside[10]. Riggi discovered "rows of invisible stitches approximately 2 cms apart [that] run parallel to the main longitudinal axis" and "the colour of the thread used for this stitching blends in perfectly with the threads of the Shroud itself, and ... cannot be detected by the naked eye[11]. The French textile specialist Prof. Gabriel Vial examined the Shroud at the time of the 1988 radiocarbon dating[12]. and prepared a technical report on the cloth[13]. He found that the selvedges were comprised of two double threads and their construction was "quite unusual"[14] such that he had never seen on an ancient cloth before[15]. Ancient textiles conservator Mechthild Flury-Lemberg in preparing the Shroud for its Exposition in 1998 (see Dimensions #12), removed the blue satin surround and found that the two double thread selvedge was exactly the same as that of fragments found at Masada[16], the Jewish fortress that was overthrown by the Romans in AD 73-74 and never occupied since[17]!

Problem for the forgery theoryLeading Shroud sceptic Antonio Lombatti, does not dispute Flury-Lemberg's diagram of stitching found at Masada, being identical to that found on the Shroud but he claims, without evidence, that, "... at Masada they were found many different types of stitching ... and there is nothing strange if one of them has even been used in the Middle Ages for the Shroud"[18]. But if that was true, there would be other medieval cloths which have stitching identical to that found at Masada. And why would that stitching identical to that found at Masada be only on the Shroud? We have already seen that the Shroud's dimensions are very close to the 8 by 2 Assyrian standard cubits of Jesus day (see again Dimensions #12). And we shall see further evidence from the Shroud's cloth itself, that it is in fact a first-century, Middle-Eastern burial shroud, consistent with the "linen shroud" in which the Gospels record Jesus' body was buried (Mt 27:59; Mk 15:46; Lk 23:53)!

To be continued in the next part #20 of thia series.

Notes
1. This post is copyright. I grant permission to quote from any part of this post (but not the whole post), provided it includes a reference citing my name, its subject heading, its date, and a hyperlink back to this page. [return]
1a. Wilson, I., 1998, "The Blood and the Shroud: New Evidence that the World's Most Sacred Relic is Real," Simon & Schuster: New York NY, p.71. [return]
2. Extract from Latendresse, M., 2010, "Shroud Scope: Durante 2002: Vertical," Sindonology.org. [return]
3. Wilson, I., 1979, "The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Cloth of Jesus?," [1978], Image Books: New York NY, Revised edition, p.31. [return]
4. Wilson, I., 2010, "The Shroud: The 2000-Year-Old Mystery Solved," Bantam Press: London, pp.72, 315. [return]
5. Wilson, 2010, p.315. [return]
6. Wilson, I., 2000, "`The Turin Shroud - past, present and future', Turin, 2-5 March, 2000 - probably the best-ever Shroud Symposium," British Society for the Turin Shroud Newsletter, No. 51, June. [return]
7. Wilson, I. & Schwortz, B., 2000, "The Turin Shroud: The Illustrated Evidence," Michael O'Mara Books: London, p.23. [return]
8. Petrosillo, O. & Marinelli, E., 1996, "The Enigma of the Shroud: A Challenge to Science," Scerri, L.J., transl., Publishers Enterprises Group: Malta, p.161. [return]
9. Wilson, 1998, p.71. [return]
10. Wilson, 1998, p.71. [return]
11. Wilson, 1998, pp.71-72. [return]
12. Wilson, I., 1990, "Recent Publications," British Society for the Turin Shroud Newsletter, No. 26, September/October, pp.11-18, 14. [return]
13. Vial, G., 1991, "The Shroud of Turin: A Technical Study," Shroud Spectrum International, No. 38/39, Mar/June, pp.7-20. [return]
14. Vial, 1991, p.12. [return]
15. Morgan, R.H., 1989, "Paris Symposium report - part I," Shroud News, No. 55, October, pp.5-23, 22. [return]
16. Wilson, 2010, p.74. [return]
17. "Masada: First Jewish-Roman War," Wikipedia, 18 October 2020. [return]
18. Lombatti, A., 2009, "The Shroud and the Judaism of Jesus' time," CICAP, 2 March. Translated from Italian by Google. [return]

Posted: 19 October 2020. Updated: 18 April 2021.

Shroud of Turin News, August & September 2020

© Stephen E. Jones[1]

[Previous: July 2020] [Next: October 2020]

This is the August & September 2020 issue of my Shroud of Turin News. The `smartest guys in the room' at Google have `improved' their Blogger interface such that, as one of their bloggers since 2007, over 13 years, I find it almost unusable and much inferior to their previous interface! And I am not alone in this - see this criticism which I fully agree with. In particular I won't be able to present my blog's statistics every month, so my Shroud of Turin News will now be mostly just news. Which may be a blessing in disguise! So I have removed the "Editorial and News" from the title. The articles' words are bold to distingish them from mine.

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News:
"How the Black Plague turned the Shroud of Turin into a beloved relic," Religion News Services, 11 August 2020, Menachem Wecker "... For

[Above (enlarge): "Undated [sic 1931] full-length photographic negatives of the Shroud of Turin, taken at the Church of Saint-Sulpice in Paris. Image courtesy of Creative [sic Wikimedia] Commons August 11, 2020" - article.]

centuries, relics have inspired and comforted in dire times.

[Right (enlarge)[2]: An ink drawing in the Pray Codex which is dated 1192-95[3]. As can be seen, Jesus is depicted nude with His hands crossed right over left, awkwardly at the wrists, covering His groin, identical to the Shroud[4]! These are only two of the at least "eight [and by my count twelve - see 27May12] telling correspondences between the Shroud and ... the Pray Codex"[5]! This is artistic proof beyond reasonable doubt that the Shoud existed at least 65 years before the earliest radiocarbon date of 1260[6] and 157 years before the latest date, 1352, that Vikan claims the Shroud was created[7] - see below!]

That's particularly true of the Shroud of Turin, which became a beloved relic during the Black Death. And the medieval history of relics has a lot to say to the socially distant craving human contact, according to Gary Vikan, former director of Baltimore's Walters Art Museum and author of the new book "The Holy Shroud: A Brilliant Hoax in the Time of the Black Death." While millions of believers hold the linen Shroud of Turin to be Jesus' actual burial cloth retaining his bodily imprint, Vikan sees it as "the greatest deception in the history of Christianity," he writes ... It is Vikan who is deceived! The Pray Codex alone (and it isn't alone - see below for starters) proves that Vikan's claim that the Shroud was created in 1350-52 by Naddo Ceccarelli (1320-47)[9] is false! Not only does Vikan provide no evidence that Ceccarelli forged the Shroud, he had already died in Italy in 1347, the year the Black Death began in France[10]!

"Former Walters director Gary Vikan chronicles ‘the greatest deception in the history of Christianity'," Baltimore Sun, 20 August 2020 A new book about the Shroud of Turin, by former Walters Art

[Above (enlarge): "Surrender of the Mandylion [the `Image of Edessa] to the Byzantines"[11]]. An eleventh century depiction by John Skylitzes (c. 1040–1101)[12] of the transfer of the Image of Edessa, behind the face image of which is the full-length Shroud [see 15Sep12], from Edessa (left) to Constantinople (right) via Byzantine general John Kourkouas (fl. 915–946) to Byzantine Emperor Romanos I Lekapenos (r. 919–944) in 944 [see "944b"]. This is artistic proof beyond reasonable doubt that the Shroud (as the Image of Edessa "four-doubled" (Greek tetradiplon) - see 15Sep12] was in existence in Constantiople in 944 [see "944b"] and before that in Edessa in 544 [see "544"]. This is 316 and 716 years respectively before the Shroud's earliest 1260 radiocarbon date and 408 and 808 years respectively before the latest date, 1352, that Vikan claims the Shroud was created [see above]!

Museum director Gary Vikan, was published in May ... Vikan is clear in his conclusion — that the famous Shroud of Turin was not, as long purported, the burial cloth used on the body of the crucified Christ But Vikan calls it "the greatest deception in the history of Christianity," not a miracle but a mysterious work of art. It does not date from biblical times and the Holy Land, he says, but from the Middle Ages, the time of the deadliest pandemic in recorded history, and a French hamlet called Lirey. The shroud suddenly appeared there, Vikan reports, with no explanation, no back story like those that accompany authentic relics ... This is false, as I pointed out in my post of 21Jun20, there is objective, historical evidence that the Shroud existed in Constantinople in 1201 [see "1201"]. Which is 154 years before the Shroud was exhibited at Lirey in c. 1355 [see "c.1355"], 59 years before the earliest radiocarbon date of 1260, and 151 years before the last date, 1352, that Vikan claims the Shroud was forged (see above)!

I have Vikan's book and, as promised in my May and June 2020 Shroud News, I will start reviewing it here, when I get time. Vikan is an art historian but there is no index entry in his book of the Pray Codex or John Skylitzes, for starters. So Vikan is yet another Shroud sceptic example of `the blind leading the blind' (Mt 15:14; Lk 6:39):

[Above (enlarge)[13]: "The Blind Leading the Blind," 1568, by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c.1525-1569).]

I had intended splitting this "August & September 2020" post into two "August 2020" and "September 2020" Shroud News posts. But I couldn't find any September news articles about the Shroud worth mentioning, so I will end this post here. My next Shroud News post will be for "October 2020."

Notes:
1. This post is copyright. I grant permission to extract or quote from any part of it (but not the whole post), provided the extract or quote includes a reference citing my name, its title, its date, and a hyperlink back to this page. [return]
2. Berkovits, I., 1969, "Illuminated Manuscripts in Hungary, XI-XVI Centuries," Horn, Z., transl., West, A., rev., Irish University Press: Shannon, Ireland, pl. III. [return]
3. Berkovits, 1969, p.19; Wilson, I., 1996, "The Evidence of the Shroud," Guild Publishing: London, pp.114-13; Wilson, I., 1991, "Holy Faces, Secret Places: The Quest for Jesus' True Likeness," Doubleday: London, pp.150-151; Petrosillo, O. & Marinelli, E., 1996, "The Enigma of the Shroud: A Challenge to Science," Scerri, L.J., transl., Publishers Enterprises Group: Malta, pp.162-163; Scavone, D.C., 1999, "A Hundred Years of Historical Studies on the Turin Shroud," Paper presented at the Third International Congress on the Shroud of Turin, 6 June 1999, Turin, Italy, in Minor, M., Adler, A.D. & Piczek, I., eds., 2002, "The Shroud of Turin: Unraveling the Mystery: Proceedings of the 1999 Dallas Symposium," Alexander Books: Alexander NC, p.64; Wilson, I., 1999, "The Blood and the Shroud: New Evidence that the World's Most Sacred Relic is Real," Simon & Schuster: New York NY, p.146; Wilson, I. & Schwortz, B., 2000, "The Turin Shroud: The Illustrated Evidence," Michael O'Mara Books: London, p.116; Guerrera, V., 2001, "The Shroud of Turin: A Case for Authenticity," TAN: Rockford IL, p.104; de Wesselow, T., 2012, "The Sign: The Shroud of Turin and the Secret of the Resurrection," Viking: London, pp.179, 190. [return]
4. Wilson, I., 1979, "The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Cloth of Jesus?," [1979], Image Books: New York NY, Revised edition, p.160; Wilson, 1996, pp.114-13; de Wesselow, 2012, pp.179-179. [return]
5. de Wesselow, 2012, p.190; Guerrera, 2001, p.105. [return]
6. Maloney, P.C., "Researching the Shroud of Turin: 1999 to the Present: A Brief Survey of Findings and Views," in Minor, 2002, p.33; Marino, J.G., 2011, "Wrapped up in the Shroud: Chronicle of a Passion," Cradle Press: St. Louis MO, p.53. [return]
7. Vikan, G., 2020, "The Holy Shroud: A Brilliant Hoax in the Time of the Black Death," Pegasus Books: New York NY, pp.xv, 134. [return]
9. Vikan, 2020, p.134. [return]
10. "Black Death in France," Wikipedia, 9 October 2020. [return]
11. "File:Surrender of the Mandylion to the Byzantines.jpg," in "Chronography of John Skylitzes, cod. Vitr. 26-2, folio 131a, Madrid National Library, Wikimedia Commons, 20 December 2012. [return]
12. "John Skylitzes," Wikipedia, 6 May 2020. [return]
13. "File:Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1568) The Blind Leading the Blind.jpg," Wikimedia Commons, 1 July 2020. [return]

Posted: 14 October 2020. Updated: 22 February 2021.