Veronica

Francesco Mochi, La Veronica.

Veronica was a saint who lived in the first century, A.D. According to legend, Veronica saw the bruised and bleeding face of Jesus on the way to His crucifixion, and wiped it with a cloth, miraculously transferring the image.

According to Eusebius in his history of the church, there lived a woman at Caesaria who was the woman of Matthew 9:20-22:

And, behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment:

For she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole.

But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour.

It was claimed that this woman was the Veronica who wiped Jesus' brow, according to the apocryphal Acts of Pilate. In her later life she had moved to France after marrying a Christian convert, Zaccheus (from Luke 19:1–10). She lived and died in the Bordeaux district, having also brought relics of the Virgin Mary.

While the life of Veronica is subject to speculation, the word itself is based on a combination of the Latin word "vera", meaning "true", and the Greek word "icon" (εικών), literally meaning "true image", and is possibly the earliest known title for the mandylion, an object of veneration by the Eastern Church.

See also[edit]

• Mandylion
• Shroud of Turin