Possible_Early_References

=Possible Refrences to the Images on the Shroud of Turin Prior to the 13th Century=


 * 1.** Lines from the //Hymn of the// Pearl. Scholars variously attribute the date of this hymn to between 50 CE and 300 CE. It is contained in the non-canonical //Acts of Thomas//. Many scholars believe it was redacted into //Acts// and that it is older than //Acts//. One translation reads.

//But all in the moment I faced it// //This robe seemed to me like a mirror,// //And in it I saw my whole self// //Moreover I faced myself facing into it.// //For we were two together divided// //Yet in one we stood in one likeness.//

See various Hymn of the Pearl translations with notes.


 * 2.** In the sixth century, an Eastertide prelude of the Mozarabic Rite of the church in Toledo, Spain, included the following lines. This prelude may have been added to the Mozarabic Rites shortly after the discovery of an image-bearing cloth was discovered in Edessa in 544 CE and shortly after the monk Leander's visited Constantinople in 579 CE. The prelude reads:

//Peter ran with John to the tomb and saw the recent imprints of the dead and risen man on the linens.//


 * 3.** In the eighth century, Pope Stephen III stated that Christ had . ..

//spread out his entire body on a linen cloth that was white as snow. On this cloth, marvelous as it is to see. . . the glorious image of the Lord's face, and the length of his entire and most noble body, has been divinely transferred.//


 * 4.** On August 15, 944 AD, the image-bearing cloth was moved from Edessa to Constantinople. On that occasion, Gregory, the archdeacon and referendarius of Hagia Sophia Cathedral in Constantinople, described the cloth as a burial cloth with a full-length body image and bloodstains. Other documents describe the image-bearing cloth of Edessa, as well. Documents found in Vatican library and the University of Leiden, Netherlands (the Codex Vossianus Latinus Q69 and Vatican Library Codex 5696, p. 35.) add to our understanding. These early documents read, in part:

//You can see [not only] the figure of a face, but [also] the figure of the whole body.

//