Photo of the Day 302

Bloodstained Shroud of Turin, New Mexico, 1980

Photograph by Victor R. Boswell, Jr.

This computer-enhanced image, created in New Mexico’s Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratory, shows bloodstained areas on the Shroud of Turin. This relic’s fame comes from the imprint of a life-size, bearded man on the linen cloth. The shroud also contains traces of blood and marks consistent with scourging and crucifixion. While some believe this cloth covered Jesus at the time of his burial, the shroud’s origins and authenticity remain a source of controversy.

(Photo shot on assignment for, but not published in, "The Mystery of the Shroud," June 1980, National Geographic magazine)