ONE: In Hereford Museum there is a tantalising piece of rubble found while excavating for some building work in the nearby village of Canon Pyon.
It is part of a Lamentation scene, and shows Jesus’s torso, his arms crossed Shroud-wise at the wrists. The museum keeps a couple of fragments of the rest of the composition in storage. They resemble the traditional figures of Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea. The whole may have been part of a reredos, and was probably part of a set, including a “Three Marys” scene. It dates from the late Middle Ages and is made of alabaster, possibly in Nottingham, which was the centre of the alabaster industry in England, as well as exporting to the continent.
TWO: In the Encyclopaedia Londinensis, compiled and printed by John Wilkes at the beginning of the 19th century, the Herefordshire town of Leominster is specifically recorded as being famous for its flax, “the country about it producing the best kind of that valuable plant.” Flax dressing in watercourses in North Herefordshire had been sporadically banned in the 16th and 17th centuries because of the pollution it caused, and over 200 fieldnames including ‘flax’ or ‘hemp’ are mentioned in the Tithe Maps. There seems to have been a thriving linen industry in the area.
THREE: Bishop of Peter d’Aigueblanche, a nobleman from Savoy, began the reconstruction of the North Transept of Hereford Cathedral, complete with elaborate Easter Sepulchre, in about 1250. The building was finished before the end of the century. Bishop d’Aigueblanche also established a church in Aiguebelle, in Savoy, which, unusually for the area, used a liturgy peculiar to Hereford – the Use of Hereford.
FOUR: Different monastic establishments around Europe all had slightly different variations in the performance of the rites and rituals laid down for universal practice. The Use of Hereford was compiled in about 1140, during the reign of Henry II, when peace (after the civil war between Stephen and Matilda) had been established and Bishop Robert de Bethune took the opportunity of restoring the damaged cathedral and reforming the liturgy. The Hereford Use was probably largely borrowed from that of Rouen, and is similar to that of Sarum, but enjoyed considerable popularity in different parts of Europe, although fell out of use in England at the Reformation.
Among its instructions for the celebration of the Easter liturgy are those pertaining to the setting of the effigy of Christ in the ‘Easter Sepulchre’, after its removal from the altar:
“At the commencement of the ceremony the cross is set down before the door of the sepulchre, and washed with wine and water, and covered with a linen cloth; the choir singing in a low tone, or rather as a lamentation, Resp. “Tenebre facte sunt,” &c.; and Vers. “In pace factus est locus ejus et in Syon habitatio ejus,” &c.: and also, whilst it is being placed in the sepulchre, the anthems “In pace in idipsum dormiam et requiescam,” and “Caro mea requiescet in spe.” In the meantime the Bishop replaces, “honorifice” the body of the Lord in the sepulchre, and incenses it and the cross. And then, a taper being lighted, he closes the sepulchre, while the choir sing “humiliter” the Resp. “Sepulto Domino.” Then the Bishop, standing before the sepulchre, sings “Memento Mei Domine Deus dum veneris in regnum tuum” to the end.” [from: Easter Sepulchres; their Object, Nature, and History, by Alfred Heales, 1868. The actual wording of the Hereford Use can be found in Missale ad usum percelebris ecclesiae Herfordensis, p 95. at archive.org.]
We note from the above that the effigy washed, wrapped with linen and placed in the sepulchre could not have had its arms outstretched (as in a crucifixion). Either the body on the cross had articulated arms, which was not uncommon in some parts of Europe, or it was surreptitiously exchanged for one which would fit in the sepulchre.
FIVE: Although the Battle of Morlaix in 1342 constitutes little more than a footnote to the story of the Hundred Years War, it seems to have resembled Crécy in its progress. A smaller English army of men-at-arms and archers threw off three major advances of French infantry and cavalry, some of whom were defeated by tumbling into pits dug specifically for the purpose (although in later battles this task was effected by sharpened stakes). The end was indecisive – the English were trying to prevent the French relieving the siege of Morlaix but were forced to withdraw a few days later, coming under a short siege themselves. However, French casualties seem to have been high, and Geoffroi de Charny, who commanded one of the French lines, was taken prisoner. Adam Murimuth tells us that “inter quos captos fuit dominus Galfridus de Charny, qui reputabatur melior et sapentior miles de exercitu regis Franciae; quem dominus Ricardus cepit et misit in marchiam Walliae ad castrum Goderich.” [Adæ Murimuth Continuatio Chronicarum: Robertus de Avesbury, p 127, at archive.org.]
“Among those taken prisoner was Geoffroi de Charny, reputed the best and wisest of the army of the French king, who was captured by Richard [Talbot] and sent to Goodrich Castle in the Welsh marches.”
However, Talbot seems to have turned de Charny over to his commanding officer, the Earl of Northampton, perhaps more his social equal, who allowed his prisoner to return to France to collect his own ransom money. In the Calendar of Patent Rolls, dated 1 October at Westminster. “Whereas Geoffrey de Charniz, knight, lately taken prisoner in Brittany in war against the king, with the licence of William de Bohun, earl of Northampton, whose prisoner he is, has gone to France to find the money for his ransom, on the condition that he return on a certain day to surrender to the earl.” [Calendar of the Patent Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office 1342 – 1345, p130, at babel.hathitrust.org.]
It must be presumed either that de Charney paid his ransom, or perhaps agreed to ‘donate it to charity’, as he is not recorded as having returned to Britain, and was back in action against the English at the siege of Vannes in December of that year.
The following year, de Charny received permission, from King Philip VI, not to pay tithes on “ducentas et sexaginta liberates terre” (“land worth two hundred and sixty livres”), in order to finance a new chapel in his home village of Lirey. [Latin from Promptuarium sacrarum antiquitatum Tricassinae dioecesis, by Nicholas Camuzat, 1610, p 413, at gallica.bnf.fr.]
SIX: De Charny’s church was completed in 1353, three years before his death at the Battle of Poitiers. It was expensive to maintain, and King John II (Philip VI’s successor) granted de Charny another hundred lives amortisation for the upkeep of the church, its dean and canons. Pilgrims no doubt contributed in their turn, although the relics de Charny had managed to acquire were unimpressive, mainly a piece of the true cross and a hair from the head of the Virgin Mary. These were ten a penny across France and unlikely to be much of a draw. De Charny’s own reputation may have been the strongest attraction.
SEVEN: The Shroud of Turin looks as if it were designed ceremonially to wrap an effigy at the high altar, which was then taken to the Easter Sepulchre in the North Transept. Between its deposition there and the Quem Quaeritis ceremony on Easter Day, the effigy was removed and the Shroud folded into four for easier transport back to the altar. At some point during one of these ceremonies, one of the clerics, bearing thuribles and candles, carelessly spilt burning incense onto the Shroud, which drilled its way through all four layers before it could be lifted out and the embers flicked off. Held out after being unfolded, four similar groups of holes spoiled the shroud, which may have been withdrawn from service. Whether it was replaced, and if so what with, is not recorded.
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UPON evidence just as flimsy is the story of the Shroud’s authenticity built, so who’s to deny me the following speculation, that the spoiled Shroud was given to Geoffrey de Charny as a souvenir of his time in Herefordshire, brought to Lirey for storage and admiration, and after his death, transmogrified by the dean and chapter into the genuine burial shroud of Christ, inspiring pilgrimage from Paris and increased income.
Although such speculation is not really warranted, it helps to point the way towards further avenues of investigation. It is said, for example, that Bishop Henri de Poitiers, after diligent inquiry, obtained information about the origin of the Shroud directly from the ‘artificer’ who made it. Presumably he would have first inquired where the Dean of Lirey acquired it from, and then checked with the authorities of that place who had originally been responsible for the cloth. This might have been difficult if it came from England, and little is known of Stephen of Ledbury, the Dean of Hereford from 1320 to 1352, who would have been the relevant ‘authority’ there. Perhaps we should inquire ourselves, of the Deans of some of the Cathedrals of Europe, such as Avignon, Sens or Mainz.