Shadows of the Past (originally titled Shadows of Past) is the debut album by the Finnish metal band Sentenced. It was released in 1991 and reissued by Century Media in 1995, including the Journey to Pohjola demo. It was reissued again in 2001 with North from Here and again in 2008 as a two-CD set along with their first two demos.
Shadows of the Past features more prominent death metal elements than would be present later in their career. AllMusic called it " pure death metal". On the introduction speech of North from Here 2008 re-release, Jarva states that at the time of Shadows of the Past the band was just a "Death clone" amongst others, so the band chose to pursue a more technical and personal-sounding direction on their second album.
The album has had three different covers: the original release drawn by Luxi Lahtinen, the Century Media 1995 reissue drawn by Taneli Jarva, and the 2008 reissue which is a reproduction of a medieval woodcut print. This version also includes an insert featuring the first two covers.
Antti J. Ravelin of AllMusic gave the album a negative review, saying the album would only find appeal with fans of the band. he wrote: "It is hilarious to hear lead guitarist Miika Tenkula try to sing while the rest of band play really low and extremely slow, as is the way in their genre. However, the members of Sentenced are quite young while they recorded this debut album, so it is understandable that they didn't make gold."