Professor Edward Hall, Head of the Oxford Radio Carbon Unit, 1988.
"Eventually, after diligent enquiry, and examination he (Henri of Poitiers) discovered the fraud and how the said cloth had been cunningly painted. "
d'Arcis, Bishop of Troyes, 1389.
If you chose this page as the first phase of your investigation you would be forgiven for stopping right here, concluding that the Shroud is a fake, and moving on. However, before you do, consider the following: no one, so far, has been able to work out how the forgery was done or, in any way, to replicate an image with the same physical and chemical characteristics. It does not mean that will not happen and, indeed, this site is actively seeking people willing to try. In addition, Ian Wilson, with a lifetime's painstaking detailed research, has set out the circumstances in which the Bishop of Troyes made this allegation and revealed a set of circumstances that sets the accusation in a context far less certain than it is stated. (See The Shroud, published by Bantam, 2010).
To counter the conflict between the appearance of the Shroud and Da Vinci's birth, the (only) witness for the prosecution, author, Lynn Picknett, claims that Da Vinci was hired by the Savoy family to make our "fake" shroud to replace the one that was damaged by the 1532 fire. This stretches credulity even further because Da Vinci died 14 years before the fire. However, as the Da Vinci theory is the only specific one we have I took an opportunity to see if there was any possibility it might stand up.