Both the Vatican and the Italian royal family, the Savoys, who were the guardians and owners of the shroud, feared that the German leader, who had an interest in the esoteric, might try to steal the linen cloth.

Officially this was to protect it from possible bombing (in Turin). In reality, it was moved to hide it from Hitler who was apparently obsessed by it. When he visited Italy in 1938, top-ranking Nazi aides asked unusual and insistent questions about the Shroud.

The shroud, which is supposed to have wrapped Christ’s body after he was crucified, was returned to Turin in 1946 on the orders of Italy’s last king, Umberto II. While millions of people believe the shroud to be authentic, sceptics…

Archaeologists say they have discovered the first known pieces of a burial shroud from the time of Jesus in Jerusalem, casting doubt on the authenticity of the Turin Shroud.

Researchers believe the fabric of the fragments, the first of their kind to be discovered in Jerusalem, are of a different weave to those of the Turin Shroud, hailed by many as Christ’s burial cloth but dismissed by others as a fake.

Radiocarbon tests on artefacts found in the cave, in Jerusalem’s Old City, prove almost beyond doubt that it was from the same time of Christ’s death. It was made with a two-way weave – not the twill weave used on the Turin Shroud, which textile experts say was introduced more than 1,000 years after Christ lived.

Professor Shimon Gibson, the archaeologist who discovered the tomb, said ancient writings and contemporary shrouds from other areas had suggested this design, and…