Pray Codex in the Budapest National Library is early picture of Jesus and his burial shroud
An ancient manuscript in the Budapest National Library known as the Pray Codex and the Hungarian Pray Manuscript. It is named for György Pray (1723-1801), a Jesuit scholar who made the first comprehensive study of the codex.
Written around 1192 to 1195, the manuscript includes an illustration, one of several in the manuscript, showing Jesus placed on his burial shroud. The shroud has an identical pattern of burn holes found on the shroud. The artist also drew the unusual herringbone weave on the shroud, something that seems unusual for the depiction of a cloth unless this was understood to be in important feature. He also included several other characteristics consistent with the shroud: Jesus is shown naked with his arms modestly folded at the wrists. The fingers on Jesus' hands are unusually long, as they appear on the Shroud. There are no visible thumbs just as there are no thumbs visible in the images of the man of the Shroud either. Forensic pathologists tell us that this makes sense since nails driven through the wrist would likely cause the thumbs to fold into the palms.
In the drawing, there is also a distinct mark on Jesus' forehead where the most prominent 3-shaped bloodstain is located on the forehead of the man of the shroud.
There can be little question that this illustrator of the Hungarian Pray Manuscript, drawing at a time before the sacking of Constantinople by French knights of the Fourth Crusade and time before the date range given for the shroud by carbon 14 testing, and well before the medieval claims that the shroud had been painted, knew about the Shroud or the Holy Mandylion as it was known in Constantinople.
