ABSTRACT
This chapter begins with the documented history of the Shroud, whereas various hints related to its first centuries follow. It deals with a historical description of the outstanding scientific developments. The history of the Shroud is very convoluted and not easy to retrace in all its steps. In fact, whereas it is quite simple to find documents and evidence of an object exposed, contended, and conserved, it is indeed more difficult to trace it back from the remote past, when evidence fades away and also mixes up with legends. On June 1, 1694, the Shroud was placed in the chapel built by the architect Guarino Guarini, adjacent to the Turin Cathedral. That year, Blessed Sebastian Valfre strengthened the patches of the Shroud. During the early centuries after Christ, the direct references related to the Shroud are fragmentary and often history merges with legends, for example, the face of Christ on the Mandylion of Edess.
