Tommaso Orsini, Count of Manoppello sold this relic of the presumed veil of the Virgin to the friars of San Francesco in 1414. It was subsequently displayed for veneration on the Feast of the Annunciation. The original location of this display seems to have been the Cantoria dei Nepis (a chapel in the narthex of the lower church of San Francesco.
Camilla Peretti, the sister of Pope Sixtus V gave to the friars a new silver reliquary (1604) for the relic, which was subsequently housed in the new Altare delle Reliquie (1607). This altar was demolished in ca. 1870, when the relic was moved to the Sacristy.
The bronze relief that covers the funerary niche above the altar of the Cappella di San Giovanni Battista was installed in 1926, when the Sacro Velo della Madonna was placed here.