ACHEROPITA (from ἀγειροσύνησις, literally “not made by hand [human],” and in the proper sense “not false [therefore true] image of Christ”). — Antiquity already believed that the simulacra of Pallas at Athens and Troy and that of Artemis at Ephesus had fallen from heaven, sent by Jupiter (Ἀναστέλ).
Among the Christian a. of the early Middle Ages, the most famous are two images of Christ: that of Edessa and that of Kamulia in Cappadocia. They no longer exist today, but the effigy of the suffering Christ, which they reproduced with beard and long hair, can be reconstructed from the many copies transmitted by the early Middle Ages and now preserved: the oldest at Laon, Rome, and Genoa, and the more recent ones in Russia.
The history of the a. of Edessa is obscure. The oldest document that speaks of it is the letter reproduced so many times, with which Christ is said to have accompanied his own portrait sent to King Abgar Ukkämä. Eusebius of Caesarea (Historia ecl., I, 13) asserts that the letter derives from an ancient Syrian text in the archives of Edessa, containing Christ’s promise to visit the king in order to heal him.
A later text speaks for the first time of the icon as the work of the painter Ananias; then, around 600, there appears the report according to which, in the year 544, the attack of the Persians against Edessa was repelled through the aid of the icon itself. A legend rich in detail, falsely attributed to Constantine Porphyrogenitus, appears in 944: in it, the a. of Edessa is defined, following what Evagrius had already said, as the imprint left by Christ’s face on a cloth; it is said to have remained walled up, from the time of Abgar until 544, above the city gate. The legend mentions two other miraculous imprints, impressed on bricks, one of which was preserved at Hierapolis and the other at Edessa; in the dispute between Nestorians and Monophysites, two further copies are mentioned that were supposed to have been in the churches of Edessa.
Apparently, in the year 944 the icon of Edessa was brought to Constantinople, probably together with the aforementioned letter from Christ to King Abgar and with the copy on brick called the Keramidon, which was placed in the chapel of the imperial palace. In 1247 these relics passed to the West, and it is possible that the a. which disappeared from the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris during the Revolution of 1792 was directly connected with them.
Other icons, too, were identified with the mandylion of Constantinople; among them are the panel preserved in Rome at S. Silvestro in Capite and brought to the Vatican by Pius X, and that of S. Bartolomeo degli Armeni in Genoa. But both are Oriental works which, as their inscription in the Slavonic language testifies, are later than the panel of Laon, painted no earlier than the 12th century and perhaps sent from Rome to Montreuil-les-Dames in 1249. They all reproduce the type of the a. of Edessa.
The first mention of the a. of Somulia dates from between 560 and 574. It is painted on linen and represents Christ as Pantokrator. It is said to have been found by a pagan woman in a fountain and, by its own power, to have reproduced itself on her garment, which was then sent to Caesarea. A second copy is found at Diobulion.
The kamulian a. was transferred in 574 to Constantinople, where it is said to have miraculously reproduced itself on a cloth, later given to a convent at Melitene. The original in Constantinople, regarded as the city’s palladium, disappeared around 800. Anthony of Piacenza says that he saw the a. at Memphis, in Egypt, on a “pallium lineum.”
The Pantokrator of the Sancta Sanctorum in Rome was also believed in the Middle Ages to be an a. The panel, which is badly damaged and depicts Christ enthroned, seems to have been painted in Rome between the 5th and 6th centuries. The head was already replaced in the early Middle Ages by another painted on canvas, an imitation of the Veronica of S. Pietro.
This icon was already greatly venerated in the 8th century. In 752 it was carried in procession by Stephen II; from then onward, the practice began of the Pope carrying it in solemn procession on 15 August to visit S. Maria Maggiore. As this procession spread throughout Latium, almost all the cities of the region, such as Velletri, Tivoli, Tarquinia, and Sutri, obtained a copy of this a.
The Veronica of S. Pietro in Rome is certainly documented as early as the 9th century; at first kept in the chapel of John VII, it is now in the pier of the Vatican Basilica known precisely as the Veronica. Faithful to the earliest reproductions, this a., too, shows Christ’s bearded face, with long hair and a suffering appearance. The original undoubtedly came from the East and perhaps was stylistically related to the icon of Edessa.
The tradition of the Holy Veronica, whose name some scholars believe to be derived from versi icone, was influenced by that of King Abgar. Around 1300 Roger of Argenteuil relates that St. Veronica took the effigy of Christ, wiping his face during the journey to Calvary; consequently, the cloth was simply called Veronica. During the Middle Ages it was reproduced so frequently as to give rise to a kind of craft among painters (the “pictores Veronicarum”); pilgrims carried it throughout the world, profiting from the indulgences associated with II.
The history of the Holy Sindon (v.) recalls that of the Roman sudarium, but refers to the imprint left by the entire body of Jesus. Traces of the cult rendered to the Holy Sindon are found as early as the 7th century, and in the early Middle Ages several examples of the relic are mentioned as existing at Constantinople, Compiègne, and Caen. Today, the Holy Sindon means the one preserved in the cathedral of Turin. It shows the Lord’s body from the facial and dorsal sides. The imprint is 1.78 m long; the sheet has an overall dimension of 4.36 × 1.10 m.
The relic was kept from 1353 to 1478 at Sirey in Champagne and then, until 1578, at Chambéry, whence it came to Turin with the dukes of Savoy. Current studies of the Holy Sindon tend to identify it with the one that disappeared from Constantinople.
Some a. of the Madonna were venerated as early as the 7th century. In the 8th century an icon at Diospolis in Palestine is mentioned; two versions circulate concerning its origin: one asserts that the image was produced by the Virgin’s contact with a column, while the other presents it as having been miraculously brought about solely by the Madonna’s own will. Other a. of the Madonna are preserved at
Constantinople, in Rome (S. Maria in Trastevere), and in various churches of southern Italy.
Among the a. of saints, one of the most venerated is that of S. Giorgio, preserved in his church near Diospolis-Lydda in Palestine; it is said to have appeared on the column when the saint came into contact with it after being bound there for scourging. - Vedi Tav. XVI.