The Sudarium exists but the Veronica is problematic.
THE VERONICA
THE MANDYLION
For those who don't know, the Veronica is the cloth that was supposedly used by Jesus to wipe the sweat from his face on the way to the cross. There are three St. Veronicas.
The most well-known is the woman who wiped Our Lord's face when he fell on the road to Calvary. This is depicted in Station VI in the Stations of the Cross. Tradition tells us an image of Christ was left on the cloth, and our logo is an artist's rendition of this. Interestingly, scholars have noted that Veronica's name may have come from this story itself rather then being a name of an historical figure; 'vera' means 'true' and 'icon' means 'image.'
Some scholars think that the Shroud, the Veronica, and the Mandylion are one and the same cloth. Note the strange crosslike florets behind the imagein the picture above of the Veronica. Note also the decorations on the cloth of the picture of the Mandylion. It is posulated that the Shroud was once folded in four (tetra diplong - an early description of the Image of Edessa - the modern city of Urfa in Turkey) with only the face visible and mounted in a lattice work or frame with ornate carving. Every early image of the Veronica includes some type of ornament that may be a representation of that framework. Studies of the creases in the Shroud show that it spent some time folded in just such a manner.
Various traditions surround the Image of Edessa... one of which has Veronica bringing her miraculous image there, others have Jesus SEND his image to the king of Edessa, and yet others have an apostle bring it. The image stayed in Edessa for centuries... and was lost until the sixth century when it was discovered, sealed in the city wall. It was at this time that many icons of the Veronica appeared in Christendom.
Later descriptions of the Edessa cloth sound like the Shroud was discovered when the lattice work was opened... In particular The Sermon of Gregory Referendarius which was delivered when the Image of Edessa arrived in Constantinople in 944 AD: ". . .And so, what exactly is it? By the simple touching to the face of Christ, an image of his form was made, so that people would not think in a dangerous or perilous way that it never actually existed and has been invented. . ."
And: ". . . And miraculously, just as he made everything from nothing in his divine strength, he imprinted the reflection of his form on the linen. . ." (This passage may indicate the awareness of reversal of the image on the cloth!)
The original Latin this sermon was given in makes a distinction between "face" and "form" with the latter meaning "body."
Both the Mandylion and the Veronica supposedly still exist... but to modern eyes they appear to be paintings, early icons that may have come, over the years, to be mistaken for the "real thing," since the Shroud, which probably gave rise to both traditions exists in its own right and cannot be displayed as either. The Vatican has one of the several TRUE Mandylions in a reliquary:
The Vatican Mandylion
To our eyes it is obviously a painting. Later pictures of the TRUE Veronica show what to our eyes is a painting of a painting.