Leonardo da Vinci: 20 Informative Facts

Supposed self-portrait of Leonardo da Vinci and the "Vitruvian Man"

1. Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452 in the village of Anchiano, a suburb of the town of Vinci, which is located in the vicinity of Florence, Italy. The house where he was born is now a museum.

2. Leonardo did not have a surname in the modern sense; "da Vinci" simply means "(hailed from) the town of Vinci." His full name is Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, that is, "Leonardo, son of Mr. Piero of Vinci."

The house where Leonardo lived as a child

3. Leonardo's parents were the 25-year-old notary Piero and the peasant woman Katerina. Leonardo spent the first years of his life with his mother. His father soon married a rich and noble girl, but this marriage turned out to be childless, and Piero took his three-year-old son to be raised.

4. In his youth, Leonardo took up the study of many subjects, but, having started, then abandoned them. But despite various hobbies, he never gave up drawing and modeling.

5. Taking into account his son's love of drawing, Leonardo's father selected several of his drawings and took them to his friend, the painter Andrea Verrocchio, so that he could say whether Leonardo would reach heights in this field. Verrocchio was so impressed by the huge inclinations that he saw in the drawings of the young Leonardo that he immediately agreed to arrange Leonardo in his workshop. Here he studied drawing, chemistry, metallurgy, work with metal and plaster.

"Baptism of Christ"

6. Once Verrocchio received an order for the painting "The Baptism of Christ" and instructed Leonardo to paint one of the two angels. It was a time when painting was practiced in art workshops by the teacher together with student assistants. The little angel holding clothes (left), which was painted by Leonardo, demonstrated the superiority of the student over the teacher. According to the great collection "Biographies of Illustrious Painters, Sculptors and Architects", amazed Verrocchio then abandoned the brush and never returned to painting.

7. Leonardo da Vinci carefully concealed his personal life, so there is no reliable information about his romances with women.

8. During his life, Leonardo achieved brilliant results in all areas of his activity, often far ahead of his time. For example, during his lifetime, Leonardo da Vinci made thousands of notes and drawings on anatomy. According to professor of clinical anatomy Peter Abrams, da Vinci's scientific work was 300 years ahead of its time and in many ways surpassed the famous Grey's Anatomy.

9. The most famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci "Mona Lisa" is written on a tree (poplar), and has dimensions of only 77 × 53 centimeters.

One of the inventions - crossbow

10. It is believed that Leonardo da Vinci was a vegetarian. One of the testimonies is given in a letter from the explorer Andrea Corsali, addressed to the ruler of Florence, Giuliano Medici: “Between Goa and Rosigud there is a land called Gambaya, where the Indus River flows into the sea. It is inhabited by the Gudzarati people, excellent merchants. Some of them dress in the apostolic way, and some like in Turkey. They do not feed on anything that contains blood, and do not allow themselves to harm anyone living, like our Leonardo Da Vinci. They live on rice, milk and other inanimate food.

11. Among Leonardo's hobbies were even cooking and serving art. For 13 years, the organization of court feasts lay on his shoulders. The original dish "from Leonardo" - thinly sliced ​​stew with vegetables laid on top - was very popular at court feasts.

12. During Leonardo's lifetime, many of his inventions remained unknown to the general public. The inventor encrypted his drawings and they were published only in the 19th century. The source of our knowledge of the inventions of Leonardo da Vinci is the Codex Atlantis, a manuscript of Leonardo da Vinci compiled by Pompeo Leoni.

"Savior of the World"

13. In November 2017, Leonardo da Vinci's The Savior of the World became the most expensive piece of art in history. It was sold at Christie's for a record $400 million.

14. Leonardo da Vinci tried to avoid people and spend time alone. Nevertheless, being in society, he kept himself open and could start a conversation on any topic.

15. The designs of a bicycle, a tank, a hang glider, a machine gun, a helicopter, a submarine, a parachute are only a small part of what Leonardo da Vinci invented or competently modified from his predecessors. But his only invention, which received recognition during his lifetime, was a wheel lock for a pistol.

16. Leonardo adored all animals without exception. Coming to the market, he bought birds with the sole purpose of releasing them into the wild - to his own delight and to the annoyance of merchants.

17. Leonardo da Vinci was equally good with his right and left hands. However, most of his works were written with his left hand from right to left, i.e. in a mirror position.

18. Realism in painting moved to a qualitatively new level thanks to the work of Leonardo da Vinci. On his canvases, he strove to soften the outlines and figures, since he was the first to realize that light is scattered in the air, so the human eye does not see clear boundaries and color contrasts. For other artists of that era, the lines in the paintings usually clearly outlined the subject, so the image often looked like a painted drawing.

19. The most ambitious restoration of the famous work by Leonardo da Vinci "The Last Supper" took 21 years (1978 - 1999). The master himself created the fresco for 3 years: from 1495 to 1498.

20. The last years of his life, Leonardo da Vinci lived under the auspices of the French king Francis I in his castle Clos Luce. Two years before his death, the master's right hand went numb, and he could hardly move without assistance. Leonardo spent the last year of his life in bed. On April 23, 1519, he left a will, and on May 2, at the age of 67, he died surrounded by his students and his masterpieces at the Clos Luce castle in France.