Remember ‘The Second Messiah: Templars, the Turin Shroud and the Great Secret of Freemasonry,’ by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas. Amazon in the U.K. has five copies. In the U.S. where you can buy a Kindle version, Amazon proclaims, “Using the latest scientific techniques , the authors prove that the shroud [Jacques de]Molay was wrapped in is the one now known as the Turin Shroud.
Well, Colin Berry, has a new twist on this. Yes, it is still a scorch ala Berry and not the chemical approach taken by Knight and Lomas and . . .
. . . the figure depicted on the Badge and indeed the Shroud is not really that of Christ – even if most casual observers assume that - but Geoffroi de Charney, being portrayed as a Christ-like figure who shared a similar fate. And it was his nephew (?) who commissioned the Shroud as a memorial to his uncle (?), given he had no body to place in the family tomb. He commissioned an artefact that would combine two powerful ideas – martyrdom for having the wrong ideas, punished by burning at the stake, and Christ’s crucifixion.
Who is Geoffroi de Charney? He was a Templar knight burned at the stake with de Molay. Henry Charles Lea reports in ‘A History of the Inquisition of the Middle ages’:
That same day, by sunset, a pile was erected on a small island in the Seine, the Isle des Juifs, near the palace garden. There de Molay and de Charney were slowly burned to death, refusing all offers of pardon for retraction, and bearing their torment with a composure which won for them the reputation of martyrs among the people, who reverently collected their ashes as relics’.
What badge? Apparently Colin thinks they commissioned a medal. Yes, this medal:
That explains of course why the figure looks nothing like Christ – no long hair, beard etc. because it’s a proxy for Christ – a martyred Templar. It explains why he looks as if he were wearing armour around the shoulders and chest. But here’s the clincher – that chain around the waist, and possibly the ankles too (or kindling?) It has nothing to do with crucifixion – obviously, but everything to do with being burned at the stake.
[ . . . ]
. . . the Badge could be used as a bas-relief, given all those knobbly bits. Either do a rubbing, as with brass rubbing, or heat it, press onto linen, as if a rubber stamp, and one gets a negative scorched imprint, hey, just like the one on the Shroud. The ability to use the badge as a printing template may have been pushed as a “selling point”. (OK, that one’s a bit of a long shot, but I have been pondering for weeks why those shoulders etc look so plump and bloated – seeking an alternative to the “armour” hypothesis – it was to ensure a good impression).
So at what stage did the scorch image of a martyred Knight morph into that of the crucified Christ with all the extra details – the blood stains, the spear wound in the side, the nail wound in the wrist? And was it done on the same image, or was it done starting with a clean sheet (of linen) so to speak?
[. . . ]
One could describe the Shroud as the visual equivalent of a double entendre (say one thing but mean another). Only those in the know – the few remaining members of a powerful but persecuted fraternity – may have been aware of its true meaning and significance.
And before developing this great historical hypothesis, Colin warned:
Those blood stains [= his previous posting] will look like a side show, compared with the post I am preparing for tomorrow … Some folk here will need to have their tranquilisers and blood pressure pills handy. Hint: New Bridge (Paris).
or an antacid tablet. I didn’t do it justice. Read Was the Shroud of Turin intended as a visual double entendre – with an martyred Knight Templar serving as proxy for the crucified Christ?
(More and) Most outstanding C(raps &) B(ullshit) for the gullible reader by CB!
Bad news for CB, I am a Templar graffiti specialist (see e.g. my -non-revised version- 2006 Loches conference paper on Chinon enigmatic graffiti, ASPAG ed)… The graffito of almost the same naked man (frontal image with no long hair and no moustache as a glyptographic attempt to feature Christ on a Greek liturgical epitaphios) can be seen in the Coudray Tower in which De Molay was emprisoned in… 1308 (six years before he died at the stake!).
Beside, has never “chemystic” CB heard of the possibility for medieval metal objects to wear out in muddy waters?
BTW, I am writing a book on my deciphering of the Chinon enigmatic graffiti: most of them are Templar and a a few are crypologically referable to the Shroud.
Corretion: “and a few are even referable to the Shroud”
I also found a Templar graffito featuring De Molay by a subtle interplay of light and shadow. He appears… bearded.
This is the first time I have seen this badge in the public arena, or even heard mention of it, although evidently the cognoscenti have been aware of it. Doubtless they can provide more detailed information about it if so inclined. Its dimensions, identity of the coats of arms, its material and other aspects would be of considerable interest. Its provenance and dating are obviously critical to its identity. Max includes the note that a similar impression of the figures is apparently on the Coudray tower.
Ian Wilson includes a colour plate of Templars Molay and Charnay being burned at the stake taken from a British Library ms (plate 28c in “The Shroud” 2010), If the colour plate is a moderately realistic representation, then both men appear beardless and also tonsured.
If the badge can definitely be connected to the Templars, it would seem to add some little weight to Wilson’s theory that the Templars were at least aware of the Shroud image.
To me, the left-hand image appears to have a face and is therefore intended as a frontal image; I cannot discern a face on the right-hand image, and presume it may be intended as a dorsal view as represented on the Shroud. An alternative explanation might be that if they indeed are connected to the Templars, they might represent the two Templar victims, although I tend to favour a Shroud-like image representation.
If the figures are indeed frontal and dorsal views, then it seems highly unlikely that they can be seen as anything else but a representation of some intended connection with the Shroud image, There is nothing else like it which it could otherwise represent,
Any potential the badge might have for creating a rubbing or any other kind of copy is an irrelevant distraction from whatever else its true significance might be, assuming that it’s a genuine article.
Just an interesting note about this medal : DId anyone noticed the herringbone weave on the cloth ? This is the best confirmation that the artist who have done this medal during the 14th century was looking at the Shroud of Turin.
The pilgrim badge (Cluny) is well known. Personnally I first examine it as early as 1988!
It is well known and described since the 1980’s…
…in conjunction with the Turin Shroud, Yeshua’s Passion, the empty tomb (or resurrectionnal) theme, the Second Coming theme, the Vergy family, Geoffry de Charney and the Lirey Collegiale.
Beside the memorendum of Pierre d’Arcy, it is the only proof that the Shroud was really present in Lirey, France in the middle of the 14th century ! So, it is very important !
I think the very title of CB’s post on the Lirey badge should read instead (in a few words)
Outstanding Intellectual MAL ENTENDRE of the Lirey Pilgrim Laden Pilgrim Badge by a Mostly Mind-Tortured Od Retired “Chemistic Losing It”
or to make it even shorter:
From Science Fiction to History Fiction with CB
I just commented on CB’s blog: “Still with your upside-down sophisticated dust bin on together with your large donkey’s ears as a crown for all your most outstanding contributions to MIckey Mouse Science and History?”
However I must admit that, no matter how ignorant is CB of it, the likeness (or semblance) of a man being burned together with possible gridlike folding marks mapping the Shroud image was a possible Late Antique and Medieval visual /pareidoliac intrepretation that could account for a few Late Antique and Medieval Hagiographic legends (e.g. Saint Laurent’s fire-grate)…
The only snag with CB’s “most unhistorical/unarchaeological reconstructive post” is that the first cryptopareidoliac rendering of the Shroud image as “St Lawrence’s fire grate”
dates back to the Vth century CE not the XIVth…
In the 1990s, I studied the Saint Laurent mosaic in Ravenna and discovered it to be a “cryptopareidoliac” rendering of the Shroud…
The Shroud Late Antique and Medieval iconocryptography together with pseudohagiographic Christian legends are other untouched research fields I am still investigating…
Most Late Antique & Medieval (pseudo)-hagiographic Christian legends are based on a symbolic imitatio christi principle in connectio with real or imaginary martyrs.
…oftentimes treated in conjunction with the Shroud….
The fact is the “entendre” of the Shroud image is neither one nore double but multiple as it “behave” as an oversized psychoclinical Rorschach test… hence my cheap diagnosis CB might well be the victim of his most tortured/tortuous mind…
A Templar who saw it for his first (and last) time was so awe-stricken by what he saw of it, he very rapidly died…
Based on the initial posting, I had made a false presumption at #6 that this object was different from the Charny medal evidently struck by Geoffry de Charny & Jeanne de Vergy to commemorate the Lirey showings of the Shroud. Hence I’d said that I hadn’t been aware of it, and I’d inferred it was a separate object. Ian Wilson of course mentions it in both his 1978 & 2010 books. As Max says at #9, it is of course well-known. I had been led astray by the comments referring to Templars Jacques de Molay & Geoffray de Charnay. But it is curious that the face does seem to be beardless – perhaps it is just meant to be representational, with just a few of the Shroud features included – disposition of the body image, suggestion of herring bone twill etc. It also seems curious that a representation of the image is apparently on the Coudray Tower where de Molay was imprisoned in 1308. I wonder if there are any clues as to when the Coudray image might have been done and who might have done it.
Shall I repeat here the same naked figure is only a frontal image with no long hair, no beard and no moustache?
The naked-Chirst graffiti stone was to be read in conjunction with a vandalized graffiti commonly known as the De Molay stone (most likely carved by the Templar chapelain, Johan du Galub) between June and September 1308.
The templar chapelain went to Chyprus once.
I succeded to identify him in a Templar prosopography (sorry for the Greek-rooted term)
Correction: “at least once”
I read that Johan du Galub probably carved the De Molay stone that was vandalized and that there was a separate carving of the frontal image of a naked beardless man. What was the carving on the De Molay stone or was it damaged beyond recognition? If du Gulub also carved the naked man, (or whoever did it), it would seem that the person may have heard about the Shroud image (its nakedness) but possibly not seen it because he carved it beardless, It is curious that anyone should carve a frontal naked man ~1308 (++?) unless they had heard about the Shroud image. Put that together with the naked beardless image on the Lirey medal and we have a curious set of coincidences.
Another hypothesis might be that the Coudray tower image of the naked man, might have been intended to represent Jacques de Molay if it was carved after 1314 when he was burned at the stake. The British Library ms (Plate 28c “The Shroud” Wilson 2010) show Templars de Molay and de Charnay at the stake, both naked, beardless and tonsured.
All in all, a curious mystery!
Thanks for the reminder that Colin Berry is completely out of his gourd. I’d almost forgotten.
Also:
“looks nothing like Christ – no long hair, beard”
Are we looking at two different Shrouds, or is Colin so desperate to see what he wants to see that he’s managed to convince himself that there’s no long hair or beard?