c. 950–980

The Mandylion feast tradition expands

Greek synaxaria tell how the image was found above Edessa’s gate.

The synaxaria preserve liturgical memory of the Image of Edessa. Descriptions of its extent are interpreted differently and do not prove it was the Turin Shroud.

The feast of the Image of Edessa on 16 August commemorated its arrival in Constantinople in 944. Synaxaria and liturgical texts expanded the story for annual worship: the image’s origin, concealment, rediscovery and translation were told as a sacred history. The feast helped standardize a public memory of the Mandylion within Byzantine religious life.¹

What the surviving source says

A synaxarion entry is a liturgical narrative, and its manuscript date is not automatically the date of every detail it contains. Later versions can add episodes or harmonize different Abgar traditions. Claims that the feast text describes a full-length image must be demonstrated from the exact recension and its wording.¹²

Historical significance and limits

The tradition documents how the image was remembered and celebrated. It should not be treated as a succession of eyewitness reports or as proof that the relic in the feast was identical to the cloth in Turin.²³

Sources and further reading

1. Mark Guscin, The Tradition of the Image of Edessa (source study). 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. 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.