• The blood on the shroud is human, consisting of five different types (O+, O–, A+, A–, and B+; negative traces bilirubin, indicating near-zero likelihood blood(s) came from person(s) undergoing severe stress, torture (e.g., beating, scourging, crucifixion, etc.).
• Wound areas (forehead, wrists, rib cage, feet) reveal 21 trace elements commonly found in egg yolk; also vinegar, white wine, and cinnabar.
• Traces of proteolytic venom present in the blood, of a type associated with common European viper (Vipera berus).
• Body image reveals traces of sodium, potassium, calcium, and magnesium consistent with eccrine sweat secretions, average pH level 5.2 to 5.4.
• VP-8 Image Analysis of eye socket area reveals contours consistent with Roman sesterce-type coins of 1st century AD.
• Linen is three-to-one twill “herringbone” weave, consistent with tunica inconsutilis–type seamless tunic; note: identical to Turin Shroud linen type; likely provenance: Palestine [see “Palynological Results,” Section 14 (vii)].
• 47 distinct plant pollens present in shroud linen, including six halophytes prevalent in the Negev Desert. Note: outermost folds of Shroud indicate trace elements of Papaver somniferum (i.e., opium).
• X-ray, reflectance spectrometry, thermography, and photomicrographology tests consistent with blood- and sweat-permeated burial cloth.
• Radiocarbon-dating (carbon-14) on linen indicates age of shroud between 1100 and 1240 AD. (Note: carbon-14 testing on Turin Shroud estimated dates between 1260 and 1390 AD.) Leo Shroud would thus appear to predate Turin Shroud.
In the course of photographing the Leo Shroud, researchers noted a similarity between the image of the man in the shroud and a self-portrait (1500 AD) by the German artist Albrecht Dürer.
Research was unable to establish Dürer’s whereabouts between February and June 1519. The Shroud of Chambéry (now Turin) was exhibited there on 4 May 1519. While the time frame is inconclusive, the coincidence is not absent interest.
The Commission emphasizes that it takes no position on this particular aspect of the Leo Shroud, whose provenance remains, even after thorough scientific and archival analysis, a mystery known only to God.
Respectfully submitted,
Silvestre Prang, S.J.
AMDG
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
John Tierney and Edmund and Sylvia Morris spent far more time on this than I had any right to ask, much less expect. Their help was invaluable. A plenary indulgence to each.
Thanks, too, to Anne Fadiman, Cullen Murphy, and Caitlin Buckley. At Simon & Schuster, Jonathan Karp and Trish Todd. At ICM, Amanda Urban.
My wife, Katherine Close, not only read every draft with patience and diligence, but drove the author from Wittenberg to Mainz at 115 miles per hour; then to Basel and Chambéry at a more sensible speed. This book would not have been possible without her, or worthwhile. Gratias tibi ago.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
© KATY CLOSE
CHRISTOPHER BUCKLEY is the author of sixteen previous books (among them, Thank You for Smoking and Losing Mum and Pup), a number of them satires on contemporary American politics. During the most recent election cycle, he concluded that American politics were sufficiently self-satirizing, and decided to venture backward in time, to a more innocent, less cynical era and place, like, say, early sixteenth-century Holy Roman Empire, where he found abundant material and characters, some of whom actually existed.
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Thank You for Smoking
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Steaming to Bamboola: The World of a Tramp Freighter
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First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition Decembe
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Interior design by Ruth Lee-Mui
Endpaper map by Paul J. Pugliese
Jacket design by Tal Goretsky
Self-Portrait at the Age of Twenty-Eight, 1500 (oil on panel), Dürer or Duerer, Albrecht (1471–1528) / Alte Pinakothek, Munich, Germany / Bridgeman Images
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Buckley, Christopher, 1952–
The relic master : a novel / Christopher Buckley. — First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition.
pages ; cm
1. Antique dealers—Fiction. 2. Holy Shroud—Fiction. 3. Relics—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3552.U3394R45 2015
813'.54—dc23
2015026355
ISBN 978-1-5011-2575-1
ISBN 978-1-5011-2578-2 (ebook)
The Relic Master Page 32
