THE ORIGIN OF THE SHROUD OF TURIN FROM THE NEAR EAST AS
EVIDENCED BY PLANT IMAGES AND BY POLLEN GRAINS
By Dr. Avinoam Danin, Professor of Botany, Department of
Evolution, Systematics, and Ecology, The Hebrew University
of Jerusalem, Israel 91904
Copyright 1998
Hundreds of images of plant parts, such as flowers,
flowering buds, fruits, stems, and leaves were found on
high-grade photographs made from negatives by Enrie of 1931.
These photographs were enlarged to life size and many were
photographically enhanced to show these faint images more
clearly. These images are mainly clustered around the head
area but also extend down the sides of the upper body and
onto the abdomen. They were observed initially by Dr. A. and
Mrs. M. Whanger, and were confirmed more recently by me.
While the images are of slightly wilted flowers rather
tightly clustered together, many of them are quite
identifiable even though they are faint, partial, and of low
contrast. Experimental studies with corona discharge by
physicist O. Scheuermann produced images from flowers
similar to the images found on the Shroud. Nearly thirty
species have been identified visually from the Shroud
images. This correlates significantly with the studies by
forensic microscopist Dr. Max Frei, who took sticky tape
samples from the Shroud in 1973 and 1978. He found many
pollen grains on these tapes, and tentatively identified
some fifty-eight genera or species, mostly from plants
growing in the Near East. Gundelia tournefortii L., a thorn,
is one of the plants whose images I identified near the
anatomical right side of the head image. Dr. Uri Baruch,
palynologist with the Israel Antiquities Authority who made
his M.SC. and Ph.D. dissertations on the flora of Israel,
analyzed most of Frei's 1973 sticky tape pollen specimens
and ten of the twenty-five 1978 sticky tapes. He examined
165 pollen grains, of which 45 (27.3%) were Gundelia
tournefortii. On some of the tapes, he found more than ten
grains in an area less than 5x1 cm. When Baruch was
collecting "pollen rain" at various sites in the Judean
Mountains and Judean Desert, he never found at any site more
than 1 or 2 grains of this plant. The images of the plant
and the presence of so many of its pollen grains on the
Shroud prove that blooming plants were placed on the Shroud,
as the pollen grains could not have been deposited by wind.
G. tournefortii blooms in Israel from February (in the
semi-desert warm parts) to May (in Jerusalem), hence
testifying the time these plants could have been placed on
the Shroud. G. tournefortii grows only in the Near East;
therefore, the Shroud could have come only from the Near
East.
Images of Zygophyllum dumosum Boiss, an endemic plant of
Israel, Jordan, and Sinai, do not need any verification of
pollen grains, although they are present in Frei's list. Two
kinds of leaf images as well as flower images of this plant
were identified on the Shroud. The unique leaf pattern
development, visible on the Shroud, will be illustrated.
Other species of Zygophyllum do not have this morphology.
These plant images are observed on both the Enrie (1931),
Miller (1978), Pia (1898) photographs, and I saw the large
leaf with my own eyes armed with binoculars when visiting
Turin June 5, 1998. All these indicate that the Zygophyllum
images are not photographic artifacts. The northernmost
place on earth where this plant could have been collected
fresh is 15-30 km between the Sea Level sign on the road to
Jericho and the Jordan River.
The authenticity of the Near East as the source of the
Shroud of Turin is completely verified to me as a botanist
through the images and pollen grains of Gundelia
tournefortii and the images of Zygophyllum dumosum leaves.
Other important botanical findings, such as the images of
some 200 fruits of two-three species of Pistacia and the
reed Arundo donax, will be described and illustrated by
photographs. Using my data base of more than 90,000 sites of
plant distribution, the place that best fits the assemblage
of the plant species whose images and often pollen grains
have been identified on the Shroud is 10-20 km east and west
of Jerusalem. The common blooming time of most of these
species is spring = March and April.