Cadavers have been used to teach anatomy and surgical techniques, discover rates of decomposition, and even to develop crash test dummies. Corpses have also been used to settle anatomical debates about how Jesus of Nazareth might have been crucified and test the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin.
The crucifixion of James Legg’s corpse
Cast made of James Legg’s flayed cadaver. Full size image at Royal Academy of Arts.
Because the Crucifixion has been depicted in countless of pieces of art, artists have debated the method the Romans used to crucify Jesus in an effort to make their work historically accurate.
According to the Royal Academy of Arts, 19th century artists Thomas Banks, Benjamin West and Richard Crossway believed that painted portrayals of crucifixion were “anatomically incorrect” and they wanted to crucify a corpse to prove their hypothesis. In 1801 they got their opportunity with the execution of an 80-year-old pensioner named James Legg who was convicted of murder and hanged on November 2nd.
Surgeon Joseph Constantine Carpue helped the artists obtain Legg’s body. Carpue wrote about the experiment (via the Royal Academy of Arts):
“a building was erected near the place of the execution; a cross provided. The subject was nailed on the cross; the cross suspended…the body, being warm, fell into the position that a dead body must fall into…When cool, a cast was made, under the direction of Mr Banks, and when the mob was dispersed it was removed to my theatre.”
Crape flayed Legg’s body and Banks another cast. Banks titled the casts “Anatomical Crucifixion” and for a while they were displayed in his studio. Over the years the casts were moved around. They were stored in Carpue’s anatomical museum, the dissecting room of St. George’s Hospital medical school, and the Royal Academy of Arts.
Only the cast of the flayed body exists, no one knows where the cast of the body with skin is located.
Cadaver experiments and the Shroud of Turin
Image of the Turin Shroud before the 2002 restoration. Image Credit: Wikipedia
The Shroud of Turin is a holy relic that many believe is the burial shroud of Jesus Christ. The shroud is a rectangular piece of linen that measures 14.3 x 3.7 feet and has the front and back view of a man with his hands folded over his groin. The male figure in the linen seems to have injuries consistent with the Biblical accounts of the Crucifixion.
In 1931 the Catholic Church wanted to substantiate the Shroud’s status as a relic. Church officials reached out to some doctors meeting at a conference in Paris for volunteers to analyze the Shroud and conduct experiments. Dr. Pierre Barbet, a surgeon at Saint Joseph Hospital in Paris, eagerly volunteered for the job.
After examining the Shroud, Barbet noticed two rust-colored stains that looked like rivulets of blood that seemed to originate from an exit wound on the back of the right hand. In Stiff, Mary Roach describes the stains as “elongated” and coming “from the same source but proceed along different paths, at different angles.” Barbet argued that the stains on the back of the right hand were caused when Jesus had to keep pushing himself up on the cross in an effort to breathe and prevent asphyxiation. He used the angles of the stains to calculate the positions Jesus took on the cross.
Secondo Pia’s 1898 negative of the image on the Shroud of Turin has an appearance suggesting a positive image. Image from Musée de l’Élysée, Lausanne. Image credit: Wikipedia
Barbet obtained an unclaimed corpse from an anatomy lab and had a cross built. When he nailed the hands and feet to the wood and stood it up, the cadaver sagged into the position like he predicted. But Barbet couldn’t figure out how the nails in the palms could support the weight of the body. So he did a second round of experiments on thirteen amputated arms donated by injured patients.
One of Barbet’s nails eventually went through an area of the wrist known as Destot’s space. Destot’s space is an opening in the pinkie (ulnar) side of the wrist bordered by the hamate, capitate, triquetrum, and lunate bones. The problem with this claim is that the wounds on the Shroud are on the thumb (radial) side of the wrist, which is on the opposite side. So the wounds created during Barbet’s experiments and the Shroud wounds don’t match.
In 2001, a medical examiner in New York named Frederick Zugibe, noticed this discrepancy and performed his own experiments with living volunteers. Zugibe strapped (not nailed) close to one hundred volunteers to a cross in his garage. He found that none of them had problems breathing and none tried to lift themselves up. According to Zugibe in Stiff, “It is totally impossible to lift yourself up from that position, with the feet flush against the cross.”
Zugibe argues that divergent blood trails happened after Jesus’ body was cleaned and the water disturbed the coagulated blood causing some to seep out and split into two rivulets. He doesn’t know why Barbet made the mistake with the position of Destot’s space and the nail wounds in the Shroud despite pushing the nail through it during his experiments. Zugibe believes that the nails went through Jesus’ palm in a downward trajectory so that the tip of the nail exited out the back of the wrist.
Categories: History
I am always learning something with your posts. This one made more questions then answers but always a good thing to question.
I hope it was informative but I think with thing like shroud research there will always be more questions than answers.
Reblogged this on A.F. Moisés Villa and commented:
Real investigation focuses onto the most possible body injuries of jesus…. Shroud of Turin
Jewish burial custom of the first century was to wrap the head separately from the body and lay the body in a sepulcher. The reason for this custom is interesting in that at the time, people were being buried alive to avoid a very expensive purification ritual known as the “Para Aduma”.
The purification process involved the ashes of a “red heifer”. According to Temple law, a red heifer had to be a “perfect” specimen, never yoked and “without blemish”. From the time of Moses to the time of Jesus, only nine such animals had been sacrificed, so one can imagine what these ashes might have cost the penitent. Thus, people were burying their sick and dying loved ones alive to avoid this onerous “sin” tax imposed by Temple law.
The tomb, or “sepulcher”, of that era was usually located in a cave that had shelves cut into the walls. This was a cool, dark, dry place in a very hot environment, so the dying would have been relatively comfortable lying in state. The dying would be cleansed, wrapped and then laid in the tomb. After decomposition, the bones were removed and placed into an “ossuary”, leaving the spot open for the next body. Normally a person would expire after three days in the tomb from dehydration and/or starvation. The state of quietus would be officially confirmed on the third day by unwrapping the head and checking for breath. This rigid, religious custom explains why the Shroud of Turin is a fake.
Jesus was a Temple priest, initiated into the priesthood during his cousin John’s Mikveh or “baptism” ceremony. This gave Jesus full legal authority to challenge Temple Law. Thus, Jesus challenged the Para Aduma by “raising the dead”. The prohibitive cost of the Para Aduma is highlighted in the gospels by the fact the very first person Jesus “raised from the dead” was the daughter of a wealthy member of the Temple. Had it been a son, Jarius would have undoubtedly paid the tax, but women were chattel and a daughter had no real value, so Jarius was willing to allow his daughter to be buried alive in order to avoid the prohibitive cost of the Para Aduma.
To make an even more pronounced, official statement of protest, Jesus had a sick and dying Lazarus set up to be “raised from the dead” as public protest against the terrible custom that had developed due to Temple law. This is why a crowd of witnesses was gathered around the tomb for the event. This is also explains why upon hearing about the raising of Lazarus, the Temple priests immediately ordered the execution of both Jesus and Lazarus. Jesus’ “raising of Lazarus” was a direct attack on Temple revenue in the same manner as his attack on the Temple’s moneychangers or “kollybistēs”.
The three day time frame of the process is why Jesus was distressed over his arrival on the fourth day to stage his protest and why he had originally been in no hurry, saying “Lazarus is not yet unto death” when informed Lazarus had died.
Another interesting fact is that, according to rigid Jewish custom, there would have been no possible way a Jew of that era would have buried a non-family member in the family tomb – no possible way. Thus, “Joseph of Arimathea” had to have been a family member of Jesus. The name “Joseph”, combined with the fact that this man was himself a Temple priest, pointed to the high probability this Joseph was in all likelihood Jesus’ real father.