Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

Chapter Seven is devoted to cadaver experiments used in an attempt to prove the science of the crucifixion in the Christian religious tradition, specifically focusing on the controversy surrounding the Shroud of Turin. The Shroud of Turin is a linen cloth that is said to have been wrapped around Jesus for burial, just after he was crucified.

In 1931, Dr. Pierre Barbet of Paris was tasked by a Catholic priest to prove, scientifically, that the Shroud of Turin was an authentic item that in turn proved Jesus Christ’s existence. Dr. Barbet agreed to help the priest and, in doing so, Dr. Barbet would use cadavers (or amputated limbs) to test various medical aspects of the crucifixion (for example, where a nail must be placed in the arm/wrist to support a man’s weight). Over the course of his experimentation, Dr. Barbet became “fixated on a pair of elongated ‘blood stains’ issuing from the ‘imprint’ of the back of the right hand on the shroud” (158). Dr. Barbet theorized that Jesus had been in two main positions—upright at times, sagging at others—during his crucifixion, which produced the two rivulets of blood. Barbet tried to prove this theory by testing it on one of “many unclaimed corpses that were delivered to the anatomy department from the city’s hospitals and poorhouses” (159).