The Mandylion was among the one of the most revered relics of medieval. Like many other relics, it made its way to west during the Crusades, eventually winding up in France in the Grande Châsse of the Sainte-Chapelle. The Mandylion (called the Keramidion in the east) was a small, rectangular piece of cloth upon which an image of Christ’s face was imprinted. The Orthodox considered it the first icon due to its great antiquity.
Agbar of Edessa
The story of the Mandylion goes back to the apocryphal tale of Agbar of Edessa and Christ, which is first recorded in Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History Book 1.13.1-20. Here, Eusbius relates how, during our Lord’s life, a certain Agbar, King of Edessa, sent a message to Jesus asking Him to come to Edessa to heal the king of an infirmity. According to Eusbius, our Lord sent a letter back to Agbar, explaining that He would not come at that time but would later send one of His disciples. The letter is transcribed in Eusebius:
“Blessed are you who hast believed in me without having seen me. For it is written concerning me, that they who have seen me will not believe in me, and that they who have not seen me will believe and be saved. But in regard to what you have written me, that I should come to you, it is necessary for me to fulfill all things here for which I have been sent, and after I have fulfilled them thus to be taken up again to him that sent me. But after I have been taken up I will send to you one of my disciples, that he may heal your disease and give life to you and yours” (1)
This Agbar was a historical king. Known as Agbar V Ukkāmā (“the Black” in Syriac), he ruled the Kingdom of Osroene (Upper Mesopotamia) until 50 AD from his capital in Edessa. He is mentioned in both Josephus anmd Tacitus. (1) It is not my intention here to comment on the probable historicity of this letter, however. If it is our Lord’s, it is the only thing He left behind in writing that we possess, which would be quite incredible to say the least. At any rate, Eusbius says this letter was carried by a disciple named Ananias. Later, after the Ascension, St. Thaddeus came to the court of Edessa and healed Agbar as promised by our Lord.
There is no mention of an image here, nor in the diaries of Egeria (c. 380), where the Agbar legend is mentioned again and Egeria says she read the letter of Christ herself. (3). The first mention of a specific image in Edessa comes from the Doctrine of Addai, written around 400 and allegedly describing the teaching of Addai (Thaddeus) one of the seventy-two sent out by Christ (cf. Luke 10:1-24). In this account, the messenger sent by Agbar to Jesus happened to be a painter and made a painting of Jesus based on His likeness, taking it back to Agbar who received it with joy:
When Hannan, the keeper of the archives, saw that Jesus spake thus to him, by virtue of being the king’s painter, he took and painted a likeness of Jesus with choice paints, and brought with him to Abgar the king, his master. And when Abgar the king saw the likeness, he received it with great joy, and placed it with great honour in one of his palatial houses. (4)
This, then, is the alleged origin of the sacred image that would be known as the Mandylion. The image was later transferred to a chamber within the wall of the city gates of Edessa, where it was believed that it would draw down the mercy of the Lord in defending the city. Later (c. 593), Evagrius Scholasticus suggested the image was “God-made”, suggesting it was supernatural in origin:
For when Chosroes, the Persian king, besieged Edessa [544 A.D.] and the city was in great straits, the citizens, relying on the divine promise, took the God-made image (θεότευκτος εἰκών), which human hands had not fashioned, and carried it in procession around the city; and immediately the barbarian host, struck with panic, raised the siege and departed. (5)
Evagrius here seems to be confusing the Mandylion of Edessa with the Veil of Veronica, upon which Our Lord’s image was miraculously imprinted. This will be a common point of confusion throughout history, as writers unfamiliar with the details of the Agbar story assumed the image to be that captured by Veronica.
During the Medieval Era
From 609 to 944 Edessa was under the control of first the pagan Sassanids and then the Muslims, and accounts of the image dry up. In 944 the city was conquered by the Byzantines and the image suddenly reappeared, presumably having been kept hidden for the last three centuries until it was discovered within the walls. It was removed from Edessa and taken to Constantinople where it was placed in the royal palace chapel by Emperor Romanos I Lecapenus (r. 920-944).
The image remained in Constantinople for two and a half centuries until the city was taken and sacked by French-Norman crusaders during the Fourth Crusade in 1204. At this time, the Mandylion and the Shroud of Turin were both taken from the Greeks and made their way west. The Mandylion was passed to St. Louis IX of France by the Norman King Baldwin II of Constantinople in 1241. There is some evidence that it passed through the hands of the Templars as well. The saintly King of France placed the holy relic in his famous Sainte-Chapelle, the chapel he completed in 1248 that contained some of the most wonderful relics in Christendom, including the cape of St. Martin, the Crown of Thorns, the True Cross, the Lance of Longinus, many other relics of Christ and the Apostles, and even some clothing of the Virgin Mary.
The Disappearance of the Mandylion
These relics were the common patrimony of the French kings until the Revolution of 1789, when they were destroyed by the godless revolutionaries. The scattered relics that survived the revolutionary age were handed over to the Archbishop of Paris during the Napoleonic era, but the Mandylion never resurfaced. The Vatican exhibits an image that many claim to be the Mandylion of Edessa, but it’s connection is not certain. It is definitely possible that the sacred Mandylion was spirited away to Italy during the Revolution, but there is no way to be sure. Scholarship suggests that the Vatican Mandylion was framed in 1623. (6)
The fate of the Mandylion of Edessa, a relic once revered as a divine imprint of Christ’s countenance, remains shrouded in the mists of history. From its storied role in the defense of Edessa to its journey through the hands of crusaders, Templars, and French kings, the image stood as a testament to the enduring power of sacred relics in Christendom. Yet, like so many treasured relics of the past, its trail fades amidst the tumult of the French Revolution, leaving only whispers of its survival in the Vatican’s enigmatic claimant. Whether the Mandylion endures in hiding or was lost to the ravages of time, its legacy persists as a symbol of the Faith’s resilience.
(1) Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, I.13.9
(2) Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, Book XX.2.2, and Tacitus, Annals, 12:12
(3) Egeria, Itinerarium Egeriae, IXX
(4) Doctrine of Addai, Chap 5.
(5) Evagrius Scholasticus, Ecclesiastical History, Book IV, Chapter 27
(6) https://projects.mcah.columbia.edu/treasuresofheaven/relics/Mandylion.php
Phillip Campbell, “The Mandylion of Edessa,” Unam Sanctam Catholicam, June 29, 2011. Available online at https://unamsanctamcatholicam.com/2025/05/the-mandylion-of-edessa