Turin shroud C4 TV show last week

[marine02]

I missed this show but read a Teletext review about it today that said no-one would ever know if it was the real shroud; I thought it had already been proved that the shroud could not be the one used because carbon dating done in 1988 had shown the cloth was from several hundred years later so it couldn't have been the real shroud? Or have I got my facts wrong? Please any clarification would be appreciated.

[bernardo]

The result of the Carbon 14 dating test carried out in 1988 gave the date of origin as 1260-1390. But unfortunately, the decision about which bit to test was only made on the spot when they actually came to cutting a bit off the corner. The bit which was tested, and which produced the dates given, came from the corner which has been repeatedly handled by hundreds of people whenever it has been put on display. It is believed to have been contaminated with loads of bacteria, which would have contributed extra carbon and thereby made the C14 test result unreliable.

There were numerous other avenues of investigation which the programme discussed, including blood, sweat, photography, etc.

There is a distinctive pattern of four holes on one part of the shroud - the same pattern also appears in an illustartion in an 11th Century Hungarian illustration, and is likely to be a picture of the same shroud.

The provenance of the Turin shroud is not very well documented, but there is another cloth which has got a well-documented history going back to the 6th century. It is believed to have been wrapped around a dead man's head as part of some kind of religious ritual. The interesting point about that is that the Turin shroud and the other cloth have both got blood type AB on them - i.e. only 3 per cent of the population - and may have been used on the same body.

The main conclusion of the programme was to be inconclusive, and to suggest thast new C14 tests need to be done on other parts of the shroud - and other tests e.g. to test for the presence of silver sulphide which may have been used in the formation of a photograph (one theory is that the Shroud is a photographic negative made in the 15th century using silver sulphide to fix the image on the cloth).

I think that the programme said there is more info about it on www.channel4.com/belief (although I haven't checked it out yet).

[bernardo]

P.S. Apart from the contamination-by-bacteria theory, there is another theory (sometimes put forward by the more religious people) that the miraculous process of resurrection itself may have "burnt" the Shroud in a way which would make the C14 test unreliable anyway.

Regardless of the real date, there is the unsolved question of how exactly the image was formed, how it was made, and how all the forensic stuff like blood and sweat could have been "faked" by mediaeval technology.

P.P.S. The Shroud also has a pattern of stitching which is distinctive, unusual, and matches the style of stitching used in the 1st Century rather than 14th Century Europe - i.e. unlikely to have been known, considered or forged by a mediaeval artist/forger.

[marine02]

Thank you bernardo, that was really informative; much appreciated! :)