Cistus creticus
Cistus
creticus (pink rock rose) is one of the flower images identified
on the Shroud by botanist Avinoam Danin and Uri Baruch. Danin is a
botany professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Uri Baruch
is a pollen specialist with the Israel Antiquities Authority. Both men
are leading authorities on the flora of Israel.
The visual identification of Cistus creticus images seems to confirm some previous plant image identifications by Oswald Sheuermann, a German physicist, and Alan Whanger, a professor at Duke University.
In general, many if not most Shroud scholars have reservations about the reliability of the identification of plant images and the significance of the pollen data.
- Are there plant and flower images?
- What is pareidolia and why is it important in the study of the Shroud?