944

The Image of Edessa reaches Constantinople

Byzantine sources record the transfer of Edessa’s revered image to the imperial capital.

The translation of the Image of Edessa to Constantinople is a well-attested event. Identifying that face-image with the full-length Turin Shroud is a later historical hypothesis, not a settled fact.

In August 944 the Byzantine court received the revered Image of Edessa in Constantinople. The transfer followed a military campaign in the region and was remembered in an imperial narrative, a liturgical celebration and a sermon by Gregory the Referendarius. These sources connect the acquisition to Romanos I Lekapenos and the imperial government’s exchange with Edessa.¹

What the surviving source says

The surviving narratives describe a face image regarded as acheiropoietos and give the reception a ceremonial form: procession, public preaching and installation in the imperial sacred landscape. The transfer is a well-attested event in the history of the Mandylion. It is not in itself evidence that the object was a full-length burial shroud.¹²

Historical significance and limits

The identification with the Turin Shroud is a later hypothesis. The sources need to be compared individually: some describe a face, others use language interpreted as broader or more ambiguous. There is no surviving transfer document that says “this is the linen now kept in Turin.”²³

Sources and further reading

1. Averil Cameron, “L’entrée de la Sainte Face d’Édesse à Constantinople en 944”. Consult the cited passage in the full source and its transmission context; the article distinguishes the source’s wording from later interpretation.
2. Otangelo Grasso, The Image That Should Not Exist: A Scientific Investigation of the Shroud of Turin (2026), ch. 2, “Origins and Historical Record,” pp. 23–31, and ch. 17, “The Mandylion, Art, and the Historical Record,” pp. 232–243. Author synthesis; not an independent witness.
3. Otangelo Grasso, From Forensics to Faith (2026), ch. 2, “Pre-1355 History,” pp. 32–125, and ch. 3, “6th to 14th Century History,” pp. 126–194. The book advances a proposed reconstruction; claims are assessed here against the primary texts.
4. Otangelo Grasso, Chronological List of Pre-1356 Literature Mentioning the Shroud and Christ’s Burial Cloth (20 July 2025), pp. 1–9. Prepared with AI assistance and used as a research checklist; its identifications and confidence labels are not treated as verified facts.
5. Mark Guscin, The Tradition of the Image of Edessa (source study). Further reading or contextual source retained from this event’s earlier bibliography.
6. Andrea Nicolotti, From the Mandylion of Edessa to the Shroud of Turin (critical study). Further reading or contextual source retained from this event’s earlier bibliography.