The Turin Shroud is one of the most iconic Christian relics on the planet. It is claimed that the shroud was wrapped around the body of Jesus of Nazareth when he died, and still bears the imprint of his face and body. Some believe that to look at the shroud is to look into the face of Christ himself. This is unlikely, however, as the shroud has been radiocarbon dated with 95% certainty to around the 13th-14th centuries. This is, rather conveniently, around the time that it was "discovered" and at the height of the Medieval relic trade, when the appetite for religious artefacts reached fever pitch. During this time, there were a number of claims of forgeries and multiple copies as the shroud was passed around. This is pretty standard practice for religious relics. For example, 21 different churches have so far claimed to be in possession of the holy foreskin (although some theologians argue that this is impossible as the ghostly foreskin would have ascended to heaven with Jesus, natch). There have been arguments that the carbon dating of the shroud could have been altered by contamination by modern materials, including the many repairs that the shroud has undergone throughout the years. However, in order to swing the results from the 1st century all the way to a Medieval date, more than two thirds of the sample would have to have been made of modern material. There are also some arguments that the face depicted on the shroud looks too much like a face to be realistic. The face looks more like a drawing of a face than the 2D imprint of a 3D shape. Some have also argued that it looks suspiciously like a white, European guy, as opposed to a Middle-Eastern Jewish guy.
