Radiocarbon 14 dating of the Shroud of Turin
Encyclopedia
The Shroud of Turin
Shroud of Turin
The Shroud of Turin or Turin Shroud is a linen cloth bearing the image of a man who appears to have suffered physical trauma in a manner consistent with crucifixion. It is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, northern Italy. The image on the shroud is...

,
a linen cloth commonly associated with the crucifixion and burial of Jesus Christ, has undergone numerous scientific tests, the most notable of which is radiocarbon dating
Radiocarbon dating
Radiocarbon dating is a radiometric dating method that uses the naturally occurring radioisotope carbon-14 to estimate the age of carbon-bearing materials up to about 58,000 to 62,000 years. Raw, i.e. uncalibrated, radiocarbon ages are usually reported in radiocarbon years "Before Present" ,...

, in an attempt to determine the relic
Relic
In religion, a relic is a part of the body of a saint or a venerated person, or else another type of ancient religious object, carefully preserved for purposes of veneration or as a tangible memorial...

's authenticity. In 1988, researchers at three separate laboratories dated samples from the Shroud to a range of 1260–1390 CE, providing "conclusive evidence that the linen of the Shroud of Turin is mediaeval".

Once generally accepted by the scientific community by those who consider the shroud to be inauthentic, and by some members of the Catholic Church, these results have since been questioned in peer-reviewed journals by Raymond Rogers
Raymond Rogers
Raymond N. Rogers was an American chemist who was considered a leading expert in thermal analysis. To the general public, however, he was best known for his work on the Shroud of Turin.-Biography:...

 in Thermochimica Acta and by M.Sue Benford and Joseph G. Marino in Chemistry Today. Criticisms have been raised about aspects of the study as doubts were raised regarding the original nature of the sample that was taken for testing, not the quality of the radiocarbon testing itself.

1978: the creation of S.Tu.R.P.

New experimental techniques for radio-carbon dating, which required lower quantities of source material, prompted the Catholic Church to found the Shroud of Turin Research Project
Shroud of Turin Research Project
The Shroud of Turin Research Project refers to a team of scientists which at the late 1970s early 1980s performed a set of experimentsand analyses on the Shroud of Turin. STURP issued its final report in 1981....

(S.Tu.R.P.), assigned to a group of about 30 scientists of various religious faiths, including atheists.

The idea of scientifically dating the shroud had first been proposed in the 1960s, but permission had been refused because the procedure would have required the sampling of too much fabric and cloth (almost 0.05 sq m ≅ 0.538 sq ft).

The S.Tu.R.P. group planned different studies on the cloth, including radio-carbon dating, since its very first meetings.
A commission headed by chemist Robert H. Dinegar and physicist Harry E. Gove consulted numerous laboratories able already at the time (1982) to carbon-date small fabric samples. The six labs that showed interest in performing the procedure appeared to be divided in two groups, each following a unique method:
  • Two used a proportional counter
    Proportional counter
    A proportional counter is a measurement device to count particles of ionizing radiation and measure their energy.A proportional counter is a type of gaseous ionization detector. Its operation is similar to that of a Geiger-Müller counter, but uses a lower operating voltage. An inert gas is used to...

    :
    • Brookhaven National Laboratory
      Brookhaven National Laboratory
      Brookhaven National Laboratory , is a United States national laboratory located in Upton, New York on Long Island, and was formally established in 1947 at the site of Camp Upton, a former U.S. Army base...

      , Upton
      Upton, New York
      Upton, New York is a hamlet on Long Island in the town of Brookhaven. It is the home of Brookhaven National Laboratory, and a National Weather Service station.Upton is located in Suffolk County, New York in the USA....

      , New York
      New York
      New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

      , USA:-
    • Atomic Energy Research Establishment
      Atomic Energy Research Establishment
      The Atomic Energy Research Establishment near Harwell, Oxfordshire, was the main centre for atomic energy research and development in the United Kingdom from the 1940s to the 1990s.-Founding:...

      , Harwell
      Harwell
      Harwell may refer to:*Harwell, Nottinghamshire, England*Harwell, Oxfordshire, England, a village**RAF Harwell, a World War II RAF airfield, near Harwell village....

      , Oxfordshire
      Oxfordshire
      Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....

      , UK;
  • Four used accelerator mass spectrometry
    Accelerator mass spectrometry
    Accelerator mass spectrometry differs from other forms of mass spectrometry in that it accelerates ions to extraordinarily high kinetic energies before mass analysis. The special strength of AMS among the mass spectrometric methods is its power to separate a rare isotope from an abundant...

    :
    • the Rochester
      Rochester, New York
      Rochester is a city in Monroe County, New York, south of Lake Ontario in the United States. Known as The World's Image Centre, it was also once known as The Flour City, and more recently as The Flower City...

       laboratory, New York, USA;
    • the University of Oxford
      University of Oxford
      The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...

      , UK;
    • University of Arizona
      University of Arizona
      The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...

      , Tucson, Arizona
      Tucson, Arizona
      Tucson is a city in and the county seat of Pima County, Arizona, United States. The city is located 118 miles southeast of Phoenix and 60 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. The 2010 United States Census puts the city's population at 520,116 with a metropolitan area population at 1,020,200...

      , USA;
    • ETH Zurich
      ETH Zurich
      The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich or ETH Zürich is an engineering, science, technology, mathematics and management university in the City of Zurich, Switzerland....

      , Switzerland
      Switzerland
      Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

      .

The 1985 rift between S.Tu.R.P. and the candidate labs

In 1982, the S.Tu.R.P. group published the list of tests to be performed on the shroud; these aimed to explain how the image was impressed onto the cloth, to verify the relic's purported origin, and to identify better-suited conservation methods.

Aware of the great marketing opportunity that public interest about the results would bring, laboratories competed fiercely; to avoid conflict, it was decided to let all interested laboratories perform the tests at the same time (this was also an attempt to obtain independent, yet replicable, results).

At this time, however, a disagreement between the S.Tu.R.P. group and candidate laboratories devolved into a P.R. rift: the group expected to perform the radiometric examination
Radiometer
A radiometer is a device for measuring the radiant flux of electromagnetic radiation. Generally, the term radiometer denotes an infrared radiation detector, yet it also includes detectors operating on any electromagnetic wavelength....

 under its own aegis and after the other examinations had been completed, while the laboratories considered radio-carbon dating to be the priority test, which should be completed at the detriment of other tests, if necessary.

During a conference on radio-carbon dating in Trondheim
Trondheim
Trondheim , historically, Nidaros and Trondhjem, is a city and municipality in Sør-Trøndelag county, Norway. With a population of 173,486, it is the third most populous municipality and city in the country, although the fourth largest metropolitan area. It is the administrative centre of...

 in 1985, representatives from all candidate laboratories jointly announced the end of collaboration with the S.Tu.R.P. group, proposing an alternative program:
  • the British Museum
    British Museum
    The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

     would direct the protocol;
  • the S.Tu.R.P. group would only be responsible for sampling the shroud and other (undisclosed) similar objects—a process which would yield actual and "control" shroud samples;
  • all samples would be provided in such a way as to be unidentifiable;
  • the British Museum would receive the samples, knowing, but not disclosing, whether they were from the shroud or a control object;
  • the laboratories would be given samples by the British Museum and would conduct carbon-dating analyses; they must not reveal the dating to anyone but the co-director of the British Museum, Michael Tite;
  • the laboratories would be free to perform the prescribed carbon-dating test, along with any other test they elected to, following the method of their choice;
  • the results would be communicated to the Vatican
    Holy See
    The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...

     before publication.


Carlos Chagas Filho
Carlos Chagas Filho
Carlos Chagas Filho was a Brazilian physician, biologist and scientist active in the field of neuroscience. He was internationally renowned for his investigations on the neural mechanisms underlying the phenomenon of electrogenesis by the electroplaques of electric fishes...

, neurologist
Neurologist
A neurologist is a physician who specializes in neurology, and is trained to investigate, or diagnose and treat neurological disorders.Neurology is the medical specialty related to the human nervous system. The nervous system encompasses the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nerves. A specialist...

 and president of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences
Pontifical Academy of Sciences
The Pontifical Academy of Sciences is a scientific academy of the Vatican, founded in 1936 by Pope Pius XI. It is placed under the protection of the reigning Supreme Pontiff. Its aim is to promote the progress of the mathematical, physical and natural sciences and the study of related...

, reluctantly approved the protocol, which factually put the S.Tu.R.P group out of the project after the sampling phase.

The "Turin protocol of 1986"

A meeting with ecclesiastic authorities took place on September 29, 1986 to determine which of the two protocols, the original proposed by S.Tu.R.P. or that put forth by the laboratories, would be executed.
In the end, a compromise solution was reached with the so-called "Turin protocol", which stated that:
  • carbon-dating would be the only test performed;
  • original and control samples, indistinguishable, would be provided (blind test);
  • the test would be performed concurrently by seven laboratories, under the joint supervision of the Pontifical Academy of Science, the archbishop of Turin, and the British Museum;
  • both dating methods would be adopted;
  • the sample offered to each laboratory would weight 28 mg, equivalent to 9 sq. cm. of cloth;
  • The British Museum would manage the distribution of the samples;
  • laboratories would not communicate with each other during the analysis, nor divulge the results of the tests to anyone but the three supervising authorities.


The protocol was, in fact, violated by the Vatican on at least four counts:
  • On April 27, 1987 a Vatican spokesperson announced to the newspaper La Stampa
    La Stampa
    La Stampa is one of the best-known, most influential and most widely sold Italian daily newspapers. Published in Turin, it is distributed in Italy and other European nations. The current owner is the Fiat Group.-History:...

    that the procedure would likely be performed by two or three laboratories at most;
  • On October 10, cardinal Anastasio Ballestrero
    Anastasio Ballestrero
    Anastasio Alberto Ballestrero, OCD was an Italian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church who served as Archbishop of Turin from 1977 to 1989, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1979.-Biography:...

     officially announced to the seven laboratories that only three of them, namely Oxford, Tucson and Zurich, would be provided samples taken by the same cloth zone. The British Museum would not provide each laboratory with three samples (one of which original);
  • The sole supervising institution would end up being the British Museum, headed by Michael Tite;
  • The proportional counter method would not be used because this would require gram quantities rather than milligram quantities.


These choices were, as expected, heavily criticized.

Professor Harry Gove, director of Rochester's laboratory (one of the four not selected by the Vatican), argued in an open letter published in Nature
Nature (journal)
Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...

that discarding the blind-test method would expose the results - whatever they may be - to suspicion of unreliability.

It remains unclear why the protocol was changed after its public adoption; unofficially, it was suggested that the Church may have wanted to reduce the amount of shroud material to be removed.

In the heated debate that followed, a Church's spokesperson declared that

The final protocol

The proposed violations to the Turin protocol sparked another acrimonious debate among scientists, so vehement, in fact, that the sampling procedure, scheduled for May 1987, was postponed.

On April 17, 1988, ten years after the S.Tu.R.P. project had been initiated, British Museum scientific director Michael Tite published in Nature the "final" protocol:
  • the laboratories at Oxford, Zurich and Tucson would perform the test;
  • they would receive one sample weighting 40 mg., sampled from a single portion of weave;
  • the laboratories would receive two more samples, clearly distinguishible from the original one—a decision calling on the ethical dependability of the laboratories;
  • samples would be delivered to the laboratories' representatives in Turin;
  • each test would be filmed;
  • there would be no comparison of results (nor communication) between laboratories until the results be certified as definitive, univocal and complete;
  • the proportional counter method would not be used because it required gram quantities rather than milligram quantities of carbon.


Among the most obvious differences between the final version of the protocol and the previous ones stands the decision to sample from a single location on the cloth.

This is particularly significant because, should the chosen portion be not part of the original weave, should it have been contaminated by external agents, or should it be in any way not representative of the remainder of the shroud, the results would only be applicable to that portion of the cloth.

A further, relevant difference was the drop of the blind test method, considered by most scholars as the very foundation of the scientific method.

Sampling (April 1988)

Samples were taken on April 21, 1988 in the Cathedral by Franco Testore, an expert on weaves and fabrics, and by Giovanni Riggi
Giovanni Riggi
Giovanni "John the Eagle" Riggi is a New Jersey mobster and member of the DeCavalcante crime family since the 1940s, before the family had acquired its name. Riggi was the leader of the "Elizabeth crew" in the family when he was a Caporegime. He had been the acting boss during the 1970s and has...

, a representative of the maker of bio-equipment "Numana". Testore performed the weighting operations, while Riggi made the actual cut.

Also present were cardinal Ballestrero, four priests, archdiocese spokesperson Luigi Gonella, photographers, a camera operator, Michael Tite and the labs' representatives (who, according the protocol, should in fact not have been present). As a precautionary measure, a piece twice as big as the one required by the protocol was cut; the unused half was preserved in a sealed container, in case of need.

From the cut segment, measuring 81 x 21 mm, a stripe showing coloured filaments of doubted origin had to be discarded. The remaining sample, measuring 81 x 16 mm and weighing 300 mg, was first divided in two equal parts, one of which was cut in three.
Also divided among the labs were three control samples (one more than those originally stated), that were:
  • a fragment of weave coming from an Egyptian burial, discovered in 1964 and already carbon-dated to 1100 A.D.;
  • a piece of mummy bandage carbon-dated to 200 A.D.;
  • a sample of the cloak having belonged to Louis IX of France
    Louis IX of France
    Louis IX , commonly Saint Louis, was King of France from 1226 until his death. He was also styled Louis II, Count of Artois from 1226 to 1237. Born at Poissy, near Paris, he was an eighth-generation descendant of Hugh Capet, and thus a member of the House of Capet, and the son of Louis VIII and...

     and preserved in Saint Maximin, Var, France
    France
    The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

    , which had a verifiable provenance and was woven between 1240 and 1270.


The original and control pieces ended being placed in twelve identical metal cylinders, which allowed to perform a blind test (again, contrary to the set protocol).

The dating of the control pieces, originally set to remain unknown, was published by Vatican daily newspaper Osservatore Romano on April 23.
This "leak", along with the violations to the protocol, marred the credibility of this phase of the procedure and fed suspicions of tampering.
The blind tests were called a "staging" by Evin and a "façade for public opinion" by Tite.

May–August 1988

In an nth violation of the protocol, the labs did not work separately and simultaneously. Rather, Tucson performed the tests in May, Zurich in June, and Oxford in August, exchanging information in the meantime.
The newspaper Avvenire
Avvenire
Avvenire is an Italian daily newspaper affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church. It was founded in 1968 in Milan through the merger of two Catholic magazines: L'Avvenire d'Italia of Bologna and l'Italia of Milan.-History:...

published on October 14 a report that the directors of the three labs had secretly met in Switzerland, an allegation later confirmed by the directors.

On May 18 a BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 crew was allowed to the Zurich lab to film the opening of the cylinders and mentioned once again the dating of the control samples. The reportage, broadcast late July, asserted that the shroud was, in fact, medieval, before tests had begun at the lab at Oxford's.

On August 26, news of the shroud having been dated to 1350 was leaked to the British newspaper Evening Standard
Evening Standard
The Evening Standard, now styled the London Evening Standard, is a free local daily newspaper, published Monday–Friday in tabloid format in London. It is the dominant regional evening paper for London and the surrounding area, with coverage of national and international news and City of London...

, which published an article on the subject.

On September 28, 1988, British Museum director and coordinator of the study Michael Tite communicated the official results to the Diocese of Turin and to the Holy See
Holy See
The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...

.

Official announcement

In a well-attended press conference on October 13, Cardinal Ballastrero announced the official results, i.e. that radio-carbon testing dated the shroud to a date of 1260-1390 CE, with 95% confidence.
The official and complete report on the experiment was published in Nature. The uncalibrated dates from the individual laboratories, with 1-sigma errors (68% confidence), were as follows:
  • Tucson: 646 ± 31 years;
  • Oxford: 750 ± 30 years,
  • Zurich: 676 ± 24 years old
  • the weighted mean was 689 ± 16 years, which corresponds to calibrated ages of CE 1273-1288 with 68% confidence, and CE 1262-1384 with 95% confidence.

As reported in Nature, Professor Bray of the Instituto di Metrologia 'G. Colonetti', Turin, "confirmed that the results of the three laboratories were mutually compatible, and that, on the evidence submitted, none of the mean results was questionable."

Chemical properties of the sample site

One argument against the results of the radiocarbon tests was made in a study by Anna Arnoldi of the University of Milan
University of Milan
The University of Milan is a higher education institution in Milan, Italy. It is one of the largest universities in Europe, with about 62,801 students, a teaching and research staff of 2,455 and a non-teaching staff of 2,200....

 and Raymond Rogers
Raymond Rogers
Raymond N. Rogers was an American chemist who was considered a leading expert in thermal analysis. To the general public, however, he was best known for his work on the Shroud of Turin.-Biography:...

, retired Fellow of the University of California
University of California
The University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University...

 Los Alamos National Laboratory
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Los Alamos National Laboratory is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, managed and operated by Los Alamos National Security , located in Los Alamos, New Mexico...

. In an interview with Harry Gove, Gove acknowledges that bacterial contamination, which was unknown during the 1988 testing, would render the tests inaccurate, although he also acknowledged that the samples had been carefully cleaned with strong chemicals before testing. By ultraviolet photography and spectral analysis they determined that the area of the shroud chosen for the test samples differs chemically from the rest of the cloth. They cite the presence of Madder-root dye and aluminum-oxide mordant (a dye-fixing agent) specifically in that corner of the shroud and conclude that this part of the cloth may have been mended at some point in its history.

In 1994, J. A. Christen applied a strong statistical test to the radiocarbon data and concludes that the given age for the shroud is, from a statistical point of view, correct. To the contrary
Raymond Rogers' 20 January 2005 paper in the scientific journal Thermochimica Acta argues that the sample cut from the shroud in 1988 was not representative. Rogers concludes, based upon the vanillin loss, that the shroud is between 1,300 and 3,000 years old. Rogers said: "The fact that vanillin cannot be detected in the lignin on shroud fibers, Dead Sea scrolls linen, and other very old linens indicate that the shroud is quite old. A determination of the kinetics of vanillin loss suggest the shroud is between 1300- and 3000-years old. Even allowing for errors in the measurements and assumptions about storage conditions, the cloth is unlikely to be as young as 840 years"

The shroud was also damaged by a fire in the Late Middle Ages which could have added carbon material to the cloth, resulting in a higher radiocarbon content and a later calculated age. This analysis itself is questioned by skeptics such as Joe Nickell
Joe Nickell
Joe Nickell is a prominent skeptical investigator of the paranormal. He also works as an historical document consultant and has helped expose such famous forgeries as the purported diary of Jack the Ripper. In 2002 he was one of a number of experts asked by scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr...

, who reasons that the conclusions of the author, Raymond Rogers
Raymond Rogers
Raymond N. Rogers was an American chemist who was considered a leading expert in thermal analysis. To the general public, however, he was best known for his work on the Shroud of Turin.-Biography:...

, result from "starting with the desired conclusion and working backward to the evidence". Former Nature
Nature (journal)
Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...

editor Philip Ball
Philip Ball
Philip Ball is an English science writer. He holds a degree in chemistry from Oxford and a doctorate in physics from Bristol University. He was an editor for the journal Nature for over 10 years. He now writes a regular column in Chemistry World...

 has said that the idea that Rogers steered his study to a preconceived conclusion is "unfair" and Rogers "has a history of respectable work".

However, the 2008 research at the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit may revise the 1260–1390 dating toward which it originally contributed, leading its director Christopher Ramsey to call the scientific community to probe anew the authenticity of the Shroud. "With the radiocarbon measurements and with all of the other evidence which we have about the Shroud, there does seem to be a conflict in the interpretation of the different evidence" Ramsey said to BBC News
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 in 2008, after the new research emerged. Ramsey had stressed that he would be surprised if the 1988 tests were shown to be far off, let alone "a thousand years wrong" but said that he would keep an open mind.

In 2008, an article by Sue Benford and Joseph Marino, based on x-ray analysis of the sample sites and textile analysis, find discrepancies in the radiocarbon dating area. The authors conclude that "the radiocarbon sampling area was manipulated during or after the 16th century".

In November 2008 the University of Arizona announced that Polarized Light Microscopy was used to confirm that "the major fiber content of the sample is linen".

In 2008 in a new documentary a video message from Ray Rogers, who was a director of the Shroud of Turin Research Project
Shroud of Turin Research Project
The Shroud of Turin Research Project refers to a team of scientists which at the late 1970s early 1980s performed a set of experimentsand analyses on the Shroud of Turin. STURP issued its final report in 1981....

, came to light in which Rogers stated that after further study he was convinced that: "The worst possible sample for carbon dating was taken." The video was recorded shortly before Rogers' death in 2005, and in it Rogers states the opinion that after declaring the cloth a fake he was now coming to the conclusion that there was a very good chance that this was the piece of cloth that was used to bury Jesus.

Bacterial residue

A team led by Leoncio A. Garza-Valdes, MD, adjunct professor of microbiology, and Stephen J. Mattingly, PhD, professor of microbiology at the University of Texas at San Antonio
University of Texas at San Antonio
The University of Texas at San Antonio, commonly referred to as UTSA, is a state university in San Antonio, Texas. With an enrollment of more than 30,000 students, it is the third-largest of nine universities and six health institutions in the University of Texas System and the eighth-largest in...

 have expounded an argument involving bacterial residue on the shroud. There are examples of ancient textile
Textile
A textile or cloth is a flexible woven material consisting of a network of natural or artificial fibres often referred to as thread or yarn. Yarn is produced by spinning raw fibres of wool, flax, cotton, or other material to produce long strands...

s that have been grossly misdated, especially in the earliest days of radiocarbon testing. Most notable of these is mummy
Mummy
A mummy is a body, human or animal, whose skin and organs have been preserved by either intentional or incidental exposure to chemicals, extreme coldness , very low humidity, or lack of air when bodies are submerged in bogs, so that the recovered body will not decay further if kept in cool and dry...

 1770 of the British Museum
British Museum
The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

, whose bones were dated some 800 to 1000 years earlier than its cloth wrappings. The skewed results were thought to be caused by organic contaminants on the wrappings similar to those proposed for the shroud. Pictorial evidence dating from c. 1690 and 1842 indicates that the corner used for the dating and several similar evenly spaced areas along one edge of the cloth were handled each time the cloth was displayed, the traditional method being for it to be held suspended by a row of five bishops. Wilson and others contend that repeated handling of this kind greatly increased the likelihood of contamination by bacteria and bacterial residue compared to the newly discovered archaeological specimens for which carbon-14 dating was developed. Bacteria and associated residue (bacteria by-products and dead bacteria) carry additional carbon-14 that would skew the radiocarbon date toward the present.

Harry E. Gove of the University of Rochester
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester is a private, nonsectarian, research university in Rochester, New York, United States. The university grants undergraduate and graduate degrees, including doctoral and professional degrees. The university has six schools and various interdisciplinary programs.The...

, the nuclear physicist who designed the particular radiocarbon tests used on the shroud in 1988, stated, "There is a bioplastic coating on some threads, maybe most." If this coating is thick enough, according to Gove, it "would make the fabric sample seem younger than it should be." Skeptics, including Rodger Sparks, a radiocarbon expert from New Zealand, have countered that an error of thirteen centuries stemming from bacterial contamination in the Middle Ages would have required a layer approximately doubling the sample weight. Because such material could be easily detected, fibers from the shroud were examined at the National Science Foundation Mass Spectrometry Center of Excellence at the University of Nebraska. Pyrolysis-mass-spectrometry examination failed to detect any form of bioplastic polymer on fibers from either non-image or image areas of the shroud. Additionally, laser-microprobe Raman
Raman spectroscopy
Raman spectroscopy is a spectroscopic technique used to study vibrational, rotational, and other low-frequency modes in a system.It relies on inelastic scattering, or Raman scattering, of monochromatic light, usually from a laser in the visible, near infrared, or near ultraviolet range...

 analysis at Instruments SA, Inc. in Metuchen, New Jersey, also failed to detect any bioplastic polymer on shroud fibers.

Detailed discussion of carbon-dating

There are two books with detailed treatment of the Shroud's carbon dating, including not only the scientific issues but also the events, personalities and struggles leading up to the sample taking. The books offer opposite views on how the dating should have been conducted, and both are critical of the methodology finally employed.

In Relic, Icon or Hoax? Carbon Dating the Turin Shroud (1996; ISBN 0750303980), Harry Gove provides an account with large doses of light humor and heavy vitriol. Particular scorn is poured on STURP (the US scientific team studying the Shroud) and Luigi Gonella, then scientific adviser to the Archbishop of Turin, Cardinal Ballestrero. Gove describes in great detail the mammoth struggle between Prof Carlos Chagas, chairman of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, and Cardinal Ballestrero, with Gove and Gonella as the main combatants from each side. He provides a detailed record of meetings, telephone conversations, faxes, letters and maneuvers. Gove initially accepted the dating as accurate, but in the epilogue notes that the bioplastic contamination theory seemed to have some evidence to support it.

The Rape of the Turin Shroud by William Meacham (2005; ISBN 1411657691) devotes 100 pages to the carbon dating. Meacham is also highly critical of STURP and Gonella, and also of Gove. He describes the planning process from a very different perspective (both he and Gove were invited along with 20 other scholars to a conference in Turin in 1986 to plan the C-14 protocol) and focuses on what he claims was the major flaw in the dating: taking only one sample from the corner of the cloth. Meacham reviews the main scenarios that have been proposed for a possibly incorrect dating, and claims that the result is a "rogue date" because of the sample location and anomalies. He points out that this situation could easily be resolved if the Church authorities would simply allow another sample to be dated, with appropriate laboratory testing for possible embedded contaminants.

Later events

These results, much expected by experts who had written articles on the subject in the press, still surprised many worldwide.
The debate remains open between those who, on the basis of these results, have denounced the shroud as a fake and those who challenge the reliability of the results.

Some, as it was to be expected, have adopted conspiracy theory approaches.
The events immediately subsequent to the publication of the results were somewhat peculiar.
Many of those involved in the procedure, including Michael Tite, seemed to reject or correct the official version they had subscribed to days earlier.
  • In a letter to Turin diocese spokesperson Luigi Gonella dated September 14, 1988 (two weeks before communicating the results to the diocese), Tite declared: "personally, I don't believe that radio-carbon dating would demonstrate the shroud is false [...]; it provides no proof in this sense".
  • Shroud expert scientist Jacques Evin, a Catholic member of the investigative team that had coordinated the research protocol, suggested that the shroud likely belongs to a man crucified during the Middle Ages.
  • The Sunday Telegraph
    Sunday Telegraph
    The Sunday Telegraph is a British broadsheet newspaper, founded in February 1961. It is the sister paper of The Daily Telegraph, but is run separately with a different editorial staff, although there is some cross-usage of stories...

     on March 25–26, 1989 published a report alleging that a one-million-pound donation had been made to Oxford University lab by "45 business men as a way of thanking the university labs for having shown that shroud is a medieval fake". The article alleged that the donation was used to fund the new school of Archaeology, whose rectorate had been entrusted to Michael Tite.
  • Timothy W. Linick, a 42-year-old researcher at the University of Arizona
    University of Arizona
    The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...

     involved in the analyses performed on the samples, was found dead on June 4, 1989. His death was ascribed to suicide, although mysterious circumstances led to (unproven) allegations of foul play.

Criticisms

In 1993 Dr. Leoncio A. Garza-Valdes discovered the presence of polyhydroxyalkanoate (mcl-PHA)-producing bacteria Leobacillus rubrus
Rubra
Rubra, red in Latin, may refer to :* Rubra, an Edenist serpent, a character of the Night's Dawn trilogyand also :* Folliculitis rubra, a genodermatose* Granulosis rubra nasi, a rare familial disease of children occurring on the nose, cheeks, and chin...

on Shroud's fabric and confirmed their presence on three Egyptian mummies. According to Garza-Valdes, "the scientists that carried out the radiocarbon dating of the Shroud of Turin in 1988, were not aware of the presence of this unsuspected contaminant (natural plastic coating)". Garza-Valdes outlines further, that while studying thin sections from the Shroud fibers it was found that "more than 60% of the fibers' area is bioplastic
Bioplastic
Bioplastics are a form of plastics derived from renewable biomass sources, such as vegetable fats and oils, corn starch, pea starch, or microbiota, rather than fossil-fuel plastics which are derived from petroleum...

".

The 2008 documentary Sindone, prove a confronto (lit., "The Shroud, comparing evidence") by David Rolfe
David Rolfe
David Rolfe is a computer programmer who was instrumental in the development of many "golden age" arcade and home video games. He received his BS in Engineering from Caltech in 1977.-Arcade games:...

 suggested that the quantity of carbon 14 found on the weave may have been significantly affected by the weather, the conservation methods employed throughout the centuries, as well as the volatile carbon generated by the fire that damaged the shroud while in Savoy custody at Chambéry
Chambéry
Chambéry is a city in the department of Savoie, located in the Rhône-Alpes region in southeastern France.It is the capital of the department and has been the historical capital of the Savoy region since the 13th century, when Amadeus V of Savoy made the city his seat of power.-Geography:Chambéry...

.

Likewise proposed was a reaction with carbon monoxide
Carbon monoxide
Carbon monoxide , also called carbonous oxide, is a colorless, odorless, and tasteless gas that is slightly lighter than air. It is highly toxic to humans and animals in higher quantities, although it is also produced in normal animal metabolism in low quantities, and is thought to have some normal...

 (CO), a trace gas present in air. Because of the higher enrichment of atmospheric CO with carbon 14, compared to atmospheric carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalently bonded to a single carbon atom...

, contamination by 2% additional carbon molecule derived through reaction with carbon monoxide may in theory suffice to let the shroud appear almost 14 centuries younger than it really is.

The authors of the documentary credit Dr. Christopher Ramsey at Oxford university for this theory, although Dr. Ramsey has since discredited their claim. Carbon monoxide does not undergo significant reactions with linen which could result in an incorporation of a significant number of CO molecules into the cellulose structure.

Some scholars have also suggested that, because the cloth was handled carelessly for centuries, external contamination is virtually guaranteed, and that candle smoke (rich in carbon dioxide) and the volatile carbon molecules produced during the two fires may have altered the carbon content of the cloth, rendering carbon-dating unreliable as a dating tool.

Particularly, they suggest that the silver of the molten reliquiary and the water used to douse the flames may have catalysed the airborn carbon into the cloth.

The Russian Dmitri Kouznetsov, an archaeological biologist and chemist, claimed in 1994 to have managed to experimentally reproduce this purported enrichment of the cloth in ancient weaves, and published numerous articles on the subject between 1994 and 1996.

Kouznetsov's results sparked much interest in the scientific community, but could not be replicated. Professor Gian Marco Rinaldi shocked the academic world by claiming that Kouznetsov never performed the experiments described in his papers, citing non-existent fonts and sources, including the museums from which he claimed to have obtained the samples of ancient weaves on which he performed the experiments. His claims were later substantied by other authors, discrediting Kouznetsov's research altogether.

The Russian was arrested in 1997 on American soil under allegations of accepting bribes by magazine editors to produce manufactured evidence and false reports.

No actual experiments has been able to validate this theory, so far.

While critics have latched on to the above-mentioned protocol violations, they have, most significantly, identified relevant statistical errors in the conclusions published in Nature: the actual standard deviation for the Tucson study was 17 years, not 31, as published; the chi-square distribution value is 8.6 rather than 6.4, and the relative significance level (which measures the reliability of the results) is close to 1% - rather than the published 5%, which is the minimum acceptable threshold.

Conspiracy theorists have proposed that the published results are, in fact, reflective of the control piece dating back from the 14th century, insinuating that the labs would have (perhaps unwittingly) "mixed up" the samples and produced a final report predicated on analyses conducted on the wrong piece of cloth.

More realistically, Joseph G. Marino and M. Sue Benford proposed that the sampled area of the cloth may have been unoriginal (none of the sample contained a "stained" area), as almost 60% of the cloth is because of the progressive repairs throughout the centuries.
Scholar Raymond Rogers argued, in a 2005 article, that the chemical analysis he performed confirmed this hypothesis - as the samples used in the carbon-dating show evident traces of tanning products, likely used by medieval weavers to match the colour of the original weave when performing repairs and backing the shroud for additional protection.
Others have also presented supporting evidence in this direction.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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