Why an Atheist Thinks the Shroud of Turin is the Real Deal

Francis Filas

Then in 1980, Francis Filas, S.J., of Loyola University in Chicago and Michael Marx, an expert in classical coins, examined the area over the right eye and detected patterns of what appeared to be the letters UCAI (from the middle of TIBERIOU CAISARUS). They also found a lituus design (an auger's staff). Filas concluded that this was a lituus lepton coin minted by Pontius Pilate between A.D. 29 and 32. Over the left eye, Filas also identified what he believed to be a Juolia lepton with a distinctive sheaf of barley design. The Juolia lepton was only struck in 29 in honor of Tiberius Caesar's wife, Julia.

Subsequent computerized image enhancement analysis at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University's Spatial Data Analysis Laboratory supports, though cautiously, the existence of the lituus lepton over the right eye and an outline of a coin over the left eye.