Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) – the greatest figure, multifaceted genius of the Renaissance, founder High Renaissance. Known as an artist, scientist, engineer, inventor.
Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452 in the town of Anchiano near the city of Vinci, located near Florence. His father was Piero da Vinci, a notary who came from famous family city of Vinci. According to one version, the mother was a peasant woman, according to another, a tavern owner known as Katerina.
At about the age of 4.5 years, Leonardo was taken into his father's house, and in documents of that time he is named as the illegitimate son of Piero.
In 1469, he entered the workshop of the famous artist, sculptor and jeweler Andrea del Verrocchio (1435/36–1488). Here Leonardo went through his entire apprenticeship: from rubbing paints to working as an apprentice. According to the stories of his contemporaries, he painted the left figure of the angel in Verrocchio’s painting “The Baptism” (circa 1476, Uffizi Gallery, Florence), which immediately attracted attention. The naturalness of movement, the smoothness of lines, the softness of chiaroscuro - distinguishes the figure of an angel from Verrocchio’s more rigid writing. Leonardo lived in the master's house even after he was accepted into the Guild of St. Luke, the guild of painters, in 1472.
One of the few dated drawings by Leonardo was created in August 1473. The view of the Arno Valley from above was made with a pen using quick strokes, conveying vibrations of light and air, which suggests that the drawing was made from life (Uffizi Gallery, Florence).
First painting, which is attributed to Leonardo, although its authorship is disputed by some experts, is the Annunciation (c. 1472, Uffizi Gallery, Florence). Unfortunately, the unknown author made later corrections, which significantly deteriorated the quality of the work.
“Portrait of Ginevra de Benci” (1473–1474, National Gallery, Washington) is permeated with a melancholic mood. Part of the picture at the bottom is cropped: probably, the hands of the model were depicted there. The contours of the figure are softened using the sfumato effect, created even before Leonardo, but it was he who became the genius of this technique. Sfumato (Italian sfumato - foggy, smoky) is a technique developed in the Renaissance in painting and graphics, which allows you to convey the softness of modeling, the elusiveness of object outlines, and the feeling of an airy environment.
Between 1476 and 1478 Leonardo opens his workshop. The “Madonna with a Flower”, the so-called “Madonna with a Flower”, dates back to this period. " Madonna Benoit"(around 1478, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg). The smiling Madonna addresses the baby Jesus sitting on her lap; the movements of the figures are natural and flexible. This painting exhibits Leonardo's characteristic interest in showing the inner world.
Early works also include the unfinished painting “The Adoration of the Magi” (1481–1482, Uffizi Gallery, Florence). The central place is occupied by the group placed in the foreground - the Madonna and Child and the Magi.
In 1482, Leonardo left for Milan, the richest city of that time, under the patronage of Ludovico Sforza (1452–1508), who maintained an army, spent huge amounts of money on lush festivities and the purchase of works of art. Introducing himself to his future patron, Leonardo talks about himself as a musician, military expert, inventor of weapons, war chariots, cars, and only then talks about himself as an artist. Leonardo lived in Milan until 1498, and this period of his life was the most fruitful.
The first commission Leonardo received was to create an equestrian statue in honor of Francesco Sforza (1401–1466), father of Lodovico Sforza. Working on it for 16 years, Leonardo created many drawings, as well as an eight-meter clay model. In an effort to surpass all existing equestrian statues, Leonardo wanted to make a grandiose sculpture, showing a horse rearing up. But when faced with technical difficulties, Leonardo changed his plan and decided to depict a walking horse.
In November 1493, a model of the Riderless Horse was put on public display, and it was this event that made Leonardo da Vinci famous.
About 90 tons of bronze were required to cast the sculpture. The collection of metal that had begun was interrupted, and equestrian statue was never cast.
In 1499, Milan was captured by the French, who used the sculpture as a target. After some time it collapsed. The horse is a grandiose, but never completed project - one of the significant works of monumental sculpture of the 16th century and, according to Vasari, “those who saw the huge clay model ... claim that they have never seen a work more beautiful and majestic,” called the monument “ a great colossus."
At the Sforza court, Leonardo also worked as a decorative artist for many festivities, creating previously unseen decorations and mechanisms, and making costumes for allegorical figures.
Leonardo's unfinished painting Saint Jerome (1481, Vatican Museum, Rome) shows the saint in a moment of repentance in a complex turn with a lion at his feet. The picture was painted in black and white colors. But after varnishing it in the 19th century, the colors turned olive and golden.
“Madonna of the Rocks” (1483–1484, Louvre, Paris) is a famous painting by Leonardo, painted in Milan. The image of the Madonna, baby Jesus, little John the Baptist and an angel in a landscape is a new motif in Italian painting of that time. In the opening of the rock one can see a landscape, which is given sublimely ideal features and in which the achievements of linear and aerial perspective are shown. Although the cave is dimly lit, the picture is not dark, faces and figures softly emerge from the shadows. The finest chiaroscuro (sfumato) creates the impression of dim diffused light and models faces and hands. Leonardo connects the figures not only by a common mood, but also by the unity of space.
“Lady with an Ermine” (1484, Czartoryski Museum, Krakow) is one of Leonardo’s first works as a court portrait painter. The painting depicts Lodovic's favorite Cecilia Gallerani with the emblem of the Sforza family, an ermine. The complex turn of the head and the exquisite bend of the lady’s hand, the curved pose of the animal - everything speaks of the authorship of Leonardo. The background was rewritten by another artist.
“Portrait of a Musician” (1484, Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, Milan). Only the face is finished young man, the remaining parts of the picture are not described. The type of face is close to the faces of Leonardo's angels, only executed more courageously.
One more unique work was created by Leonardo in one of the halls of the Sforza Palace, which is called “Donkey”. On the vaults and walls of this hall he painted crowns of willows, whose branches are intricately intertwined and tied with decorative ropes. Subsequently, part of the paint layer fell off, but a significant part was preserved and restored.
In 1495, Leonardo began work on “The Last Supper” (area 4.5 × 8.6 m). The fresco is located on the wall of the refectory of the Dominican monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan at a height of 3 m from the floor and occupies the entire end wall of the room. Leonardo oriented the perspective of the fresco towards the viewer, thereby it organically entered into the interior of the refectory: the perspective reduction of the side walls depicted in the fresco continues the real space of the refectory. Thirteen people are sitting at a table parallel to the wall. In the center is Jesus Christ, to the left and right of him are his disciples. The dramatic moment of exposure and condemnation of betrayal is shown, the moment when Christ has just uttered the words: “One of you will betray Me,” and the different emotional reactions of the apostles to these words. The composition is built on a strictly verified mathematical calculation: in the center is Christ, depicted against the background of the middle, largest opening of the rear wall, the vanishing point of perspective coincides with his head. The twelve apostles are divided into four groups of three figures each. Each is given a vivid characterization through expressive gestures and movements. The main task was to show Judas, to separate him from the rest of the apostles. By placing him on the same line of the table as all the apostles, Leonardo psychologically separated him by loneliness.
The creation of the Last Supper became a notable event in artistic life Italy at that time. As a true innovator and experimenter, Leonardo abandoned the fresco technique. He covered the wall with a special composition of resin and mastic and painted with tempera. These experiments led to the greatest tragedy: the refectory, which was hastily repaired by order of Sforza, the picturesque innovations of Leonardo, the lowland in which the refectory was located - all this did a sad job of preserving the Last Supper. The paints began to peel off, as Vasari had already mentioned in 1556.
The Last Supper was restored several times in the 17th and 18th centuries, but the restorations were unskilled (they simply reapplied layers of paint).
By the middle of the 20th century, when the painting had fallen into disrepair, scientific restoration began: first, the entire paint layer was fixed, then later layers were removed, and Leonardo’s tempera painting was revealed. And although the work was severely damaged, these restoration works made it possible to say that this Renaissance masterpiece was saved. Working on the fresco for three years, Leonardo created the greatest creation of the Renaissance.
After the fall of Sforza's power in 1499, Leonardo travels to Florence, stopping at Mantua and Venice along the way. In Mantua, he creates a cardboard with Portrait of Isabella d'Este (1500, Louvre, Paris), made with black chalk, charcoal and pastel.
In the spring of 1500, Leonardo arrived in Florence, where he soon received an order to paint an altar painting in the Monastery of the Annunciation. The order was never completed, but one of the options is considered to be the so-called. Carton of Burlington House (1499, National Gallery, London).
One of the significant commissions received by Leonardo in 1502 to decorate the wall of the meeting room of the Signoria in Florence was “The Battle of Anghiari” (not preserved). Another wall for decoration was given to Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564), who painted the painting “The Battle of Cascina” there.
Leonardo's sketches, now lost, showed a panorama of the battle, in the center of which there was a fight for the banner. The cartons of Leonardo and Michelangelo, exhibited in 1505, were a great success. As in the case of The Last Supper, Leonardo experimented with paints, as a result of which the paint layer gradually crumbled. However, preparatory drawings and copies have survived, which partly give an idea of the scale of this work. In particular, a drawing by Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640) has survived, which shows the central scene of the composition (circa 1615, Louvre, Paris).
For the first time in the history of battle painting, Leonardo showed the drama and fury of battle.
"Mona Lisa" is the most famous work Leonardo da Vinci (1503–1506, Louvre, Paris). Mona Lisa (short for Madonna Lisa) was the third wife of the Florentine merchant Francesco di Bartolomeo dele Giocondo. Now the picture has been slightly changed: originally columns were drawn on the left and right, now cut off. The small-sized painting makes a monumental impression: the Mona Lisa is shown against the backdrop of a landscape where the depth of space and airy haze are conveyed with the greatest perfection. Leonardo’s famous sfumato technique is here brought to unprecedented heights: the thinnest, as if melting, haze of chiaroscuro, enveloping the figure, softens the contours and shadows. There is something elusive, bewitching and attractive in a light smile, in the liveliness of facial expression, in the majestic calm of the pose, in the stillness of the smooth lines of the hands.
In 1506, Leonardo received an invitation to Milan from Louis XII of France (1462-1515).
Having given Leonardo complete freedom of action and regularly paying him, the new patrons did not require specific work from him. Leonardo is interested in scientific research, sometimes turning to painting. Then the second version of “Madonna of the Rocks” (1506–1508, British National Gallery, London) was written.
“Saint Anne with Mary and the Child Christ” (1500–1510, Louvre, Paris) is one of the themes of Leonardo’s work to which he repeatedly addressed. The last development of this topic remained unfinished.
In 1513, Leonardo travels to Rome, to the Vatican, to the court of Pope Leo X (1513–1521), but soon loses the pope's favor. He studies plants in the botanical garden, draws up plans for draining the Pontine swamps, and writes notes for a treatise on the structure of the human voice. At this time, he created the only “Self-Portrait” (1514, Bibliotheca Reale, Turin), executed in sanguine, showing a gray-haired old man with a long beard and a gaze.
Leonardo's last painting was also painted in Rome - “Saint John the Baptist” (1515, Louvre, Paris).
Leonardo again receives an offer from the French king, this time from Francis I (1494–1547), successor of Louis XII: to move to France, to an estate near the royal castle of Amboise.
In 1516 or 1517, Leonardo arrived in France, where he was given apartments at the Cloux estate. Surrounded by the king's respectful admiration, he receives the title "First Artist, Engineer and Architect of the King." Leonardo, despite his age and illness, is engaged in drawing canals in the Loire River valley and takes part in the preparation of court festivities.
Leonardo da Vinci died on May 2, 1519, leaving his drawings and papers in his will to Francesco Melzi, a student who kept them throughout his life. However, after his death, all the countless papers were distributed all over the world, some were lost, some are stored in different cities, in museums around the world.
A scientist by vocation, Leonardo even now amazes with the breadth and variety of his scientific interests. His research in the field of aircraft design is unique. He studied the flight, gliding of birds, the structure of their wings, and created the so-called. an ornithopter, a flying machine with flapping wings, and an unrealized project.
Leonardo created a pyramidal parachute, a model of a helical propeller (a variant of the modern propeller). Observing nature, he became an expert in the field of botany: he was the first to describe the laws of phyllotaxy (the laws governing the arrangement of leaves on the stem), heliotropism and geotropism (the laws of the influence of the sun and gravity on plants), and discovered a way to determine the age of trees by annual rings.
He was an expert in the field of anatomy: he was the first to describe the valve of the right ventricle of the heart, demonstrated anatomy, etc. He created a system of drawings that now help students understand the structure of the human body: he showed the object in four views to examine it from all sides, created an image system organs and bodies in cross section.
His research in the field of geology is interesting: he gave descriptions of sedimentary rocks and explanations of marine deposits in the mountains of Italy.
As an optical scientist, he knew that visual images are projected upside down on the cornea of the eye. He was probably the first to use a camera obscura (from Latin camera - room, obscurus - dark) - a closed box with a small hole in one of the walls - for sketching landscapes; rays of light are reflected on the frosted glass on the other side of the box, creating an inverted color image, used by 18th century landscape painters to accurately reproduce views).
In Leonardo's drawings there is a design for an instrument for measuring the intensity of light, a photometer, which was brought to life only three centuries later. He designed canals, locks, and dams. Among his ideas you can see: lightweight shoes for walking on water, a lifebuoy, webbed gloves for swimming, a device for underwater movement, similar to a modern spacesuit, machines for making rope, grinding machines and much more.
Communicating with the mathematician Luca Pacioli, who wrote the textbook “On Divine Proportion,” Leonardo became interested in this science and created illustrations for this textbook.
Leonardo also acted as an architect, but none of his projects were ever brought to life. He participated in a competition to design the central dome of the Milan Cathedral, created a design for a mausoleum for members of the royal family in the Egyptian style, and a project he proposed to the Turkish Sultan to build a huge bridge across the Bosphorus Strait under which ships could pass.
Left large number Leonardo's drawings made with sanguine, crayons, pastels (it is Leonardo who is credited with the invention of pastels), silver pencil, and chalk.
In Milan, Leonardo begins to write “Treatise on Painting,” work on which continued throughout his life, but was never completed. In this multi-volume reference book, Leonardo wrote about how to recreate the world around him on canvas, about linear and aerial perspective, proportions, anatomy, geometry, mechanics, optics, the interaction of colors, and reflexes.
The life and work of Leonardo da Vinci left a colossal mark not only in art, but also in science and technology. Painter, sculptor, architect - he was a natural scientist, mechanic, engineer, mathematician, and made many discoveries for subsequent generations.
Leonardo da Vinci is the greatest figure of the Renaissance.
COURSE WORK
in the discipline "Culturology"
on topic: "Leonardo Da Vinci"
1. Life path of Leonardo da Vinci
2.2.1 "La Gioconda"
2.2.2 "Last Supper"
Literature
Application
Introduction
The Renaissance was rich in outstanding personalities. But Leonardo, born in the town of Vinci near Florence on April 15, 1452, stands out even from the general background of other famous people of the Renaissance.
This supergenius of the beginning of the Italian Renaissance is so strange that it causes scientists not just amazement, but almost awe, mixed with confusion. Even a general overview of its capabilities plunges researchers into shock: well, a person, even if he has seven spans in his forehead, cannot be at once a brilliant engineer, artist, sculptor, inventor, mechanic, chemist, philologist, scientist, seer, one of the best of his time singer, swimmer, creator of musical instruments, cantatas, equestrian, fencer, architect, fashion designer, etc. His external characteristics are also striking: Leonardo is tall, slender and so beautiful in face that he was called an “angel”, and at the same time superhumanly strong (with his right hand - being left-handed! - he could crush a horseshoe).
Leonardo da Vinci has been written about more than once. But the theme of his life and work, both as a scientist and as a man of art, is still relevant today. The purpose of this work is to tell in detail about Leonardo da Vinci. This goal is achieved by solving the following tasks:
consider the biography of Leonardo da Vinci;
analyze the main periods of his work;
describe his most famous works;
talk about his activities as a scientist and inventor;
give examples of Leonardo da Vinci's predictions.
The structure of the work is as follows. The work consists of three chapters or five paragraphs, an introduction, a conclusion, a list of references and illustrations in the appendix.
The first chapter is devoted to the biography of the great Florentine.
The second chapter examines the main periods of his work: early, mature and late. It tells in detail about such masterpieces of Leonardo as "La Gioconda (Mona Lisa)" and "The Last Supper".
The third chapter fully describes the scientific activities of Leonardo da Vinci. Special attention it focuses on da Vinci's work in the field of mechanics, as well as his flying machines.
In conclusion, conclusions are drawn on the topic of the work.
1. Life path of Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo da Vinci was born in 1452 and died in 1519. The father of the future genius, Piero da Vinci, a wealthy notary and landowner, was famous person in Florence, but mother Katerina is a simple peasant girl, a fleeting whim of an influential lord. There were no children in Pierrot's official family, so from the age of 4-5 the boy was raised by his father and stepmother, while his own mother, as was customary, was hastened to marry off with a dowry to a peasant. The handsome boy, who was distinguished by his extraordinary intelligence and friendly character, immediately became everyone’s darling and favorite in his father’s house. This was partly facilitated by the fact that Leonardo's first two stepmothers were childless. Piero's third wife, Margarita, entered the house of Leonardo's father when her famous stepson was already 24 years old. From his third wife, Senor Pierrot had nine sons and two daughters, but none of them shone “neither in mind nor in sword.”
Possessing broad knowledge and mastering the basics of science, Leonardo da Vinci would have achieved great advantages if he had not been so changeable and fickle. In fact, he began to study many subjects, but, having started, then abandoned them. Thus, in mathematics, in the few months that he studied it, he made such progress that, constantly putting forward all sorts of doubts and difficulties to the teacher with whom he studied, he more than once baffled him. He also spent some effort on learning the science of music, but soon decided to learn only to play the lyre. As a man naturally endowed with a sublime spirit and full of charm, he sang divinely, improvising to her accompaniment. Yet, despite his various activities, he never gave up drawing and modeling, as the things that attracted his imagination more than anything else.
In 1466, at the age of 14, Leonardo da Vinci entered Verrocchio's workshop as an apprentice. It happened this way: Ser Piero, Leonardo’s father, one fine day selected several of his drawings, took them to Andrea Verrocchio, who was his great friend, and urgently asked him to say whether Leonardo would achieve any success by taking up drawing. Struck by the enormous potential that he saw in the drawings of the novice Leonardo, Andrea supported Ser Piero in his decision to devote him to this work and immediately agreed with him that Leonardo would enter his workshop, which Leonardo did more than willingly and began to practice not in just one area, but in all those areas where the drawing is included. At this time, he also showed himself in sculpture, sculpting several heads of laughing women from clay, and in architecture, drawing many plans and other views of various buildings. He was the first who, while still a young man, discussed the question of how to divert the Arno River through a canal connecting Pisa with Florence. He also made drawings of mills, fulling machines and other machines that could be set in motion by water power.
In Verrocchio's painting: "The Baptism of the Lord", one of the angels is painted by Leonardo da Vinci; According to the legend conveyed by Vasari, the old master, seeing himself surpassed by the work of his student, allegedly gave up painting. Be that as it may, around 1472 Leonardo, who was then about twenty years old, left Verrocchio’s workshop and began to work independently.
Leonardo da Vinci was handsome, beautifully built, possessed enormous physical strength, and was knowledgeable in the arts of chivalry, horse riding, dancing, fencing, etc. Leonardo's contemporaries note that he was so pleasant to talk to that he attracted the souls of people. He loved animals very much - especially horses. Walking through the places where birds were sold, he took them out of the cage with his own hands and, having paid the seller the price he demanded, released them into the wild, restoring their lost freedom.
There are many legends and stories about Leonardo da Vinci. They say that one day, when Ser Piero of Vinci was on his estate, one of his peasants, who had carved with his own hands a round shield from a fig tree that he had cut down on his master's land, simply asked him to have this shield painted for him in Florence, to which he very readily agreed, since this peasant was a very experienced bird catcher and knew very well the places where fish were caught, and Ser Pierrot widely used his services in hunting and fishing. And so, having transported the shield to Florence, but without telling Leonardo where it came from, Ser Piero asked him to write something on it. Leonardo, when one fine day this shield fell into his hands and when he saw that the shield was crooked, poorly processed and unsightly, he straightened it on the fire and, giving it to the turner, from warped and unsightly, made it smooth and even, and then, Having weeded it and processed it in his own way, he began to think about what to write on it that would frighten everyone who came across it, producing the same impression that the head of Medusa once made. And for this purpose, Leonardo released into one of the rooms, into which no one except him entered, various lizards, crickets, snakes, butterflies, grasshoppers, bats and other strange types of similar creatures, from a variety of which, combining them in different ways. In various ways, he created a very disgusting and terrible monster, which poisoned with its breath and ignited the air. He depicted it crawling out of a dark cleft in the rock and emitting poison from its open mouth, flames from its eyes and smoke from its nostrils, and it was so unusual that it actually seemed something monstrous and frightening. And he worked on it for so long that there was a cruel and unbearable stench in the room from dead animals, which, however, Leonardo did not notice because of the great love he had for art. Having finished this work, about which neither the peasant nor the father asked any more, Leonardo told the latter that he could, whenever he wanted, send for the shield, since he had done his job for his part. And so, one morning, when Ser Piero entered his room for a shield and knocked on the door, Leonardo opened it, but asked him to wait and, returning to the room, placed the shield on the lectern and in the light, but adjusted the window so that it gave a muted lighting. Ser Piero, who had not thought about it, shuddered in surprise at first glance, not believing that this was the same shield, and especially since the image he saw was a painting, and when he backed away, Leonardo, supporting him, said: “This is the work serves what it was made for. So take it and give it away, for this is the effect that is expected from works of art." This thing seemed more than wonderful to Ser Pierrot, and he awarded Leonardo’s bold words with the greatest praise. And then, slowly buying from the shopkeeper another shield, on which was written his heart, pierced by an arrow, he gave it to a peasant, who remained grateful to him for this all his life. Later, Ser Piero in Florence secretly sold the shield painted by Leonardo to some merchants for a hundred ducats, and soon this shield fell into the hands of the Milanese. to the Duke, to whom the same merchants resold it for three hundred ducats.
Around 1480, Leonardo was summoned to Milan to the court of Duke Louis Sforza, as a musician and improviser. He was, however, commissioned to found an art academy in Milan. To teach at this academy, Leonardo da Vinci compiled treatises on painting, on light, on shadows, on movement, on theory and practice, on the movements of the human body, on the proportions of the human body.
As an architect, Leonardo built buildings, especially in Milan, and composed many architectural projects and drawings, specially studying anatomy, mathematics, perspective, mechanics; he abandoned extensive projects, such as the project to connect Florence and Pisa by means of a canal; His plan for raising the ancient baptistery of S. Giovanni in Florence was extremely bold, in order to raise the foundation beneath it and thus give the building a more majestic appearance. For the sake of studying the expressions of feelings and passions in man. He visited the most crowded places where human activity was in full swing, and recorded everything that he came across in an album; he escorted the criminals to the place of execution, capturing in his memory the expression of agony and extreme despair; he invited peasants to his house, to whom he told the most amusing things, wanting to study the comic expression on their faces. With such realism, Leonardo was at the same time endowed with the highest degree of deep subjective feeling, tender, partly sentimental dreaminess. In some of his works, first one or the other element predominates, but in the main, best works, both elements are balanced by beautiful harmony, so that, thanks to his ingenious design and sense of beauty, they occupy that high level, which certainly consolidates his one of the first places among the great masters of modern art.
Leonardo started a lot, but never finished anything, because it seemed to him that in the things that he had conceived, his hand was not capable of achieving artistic perfection, since in his plan he created for himself various difficulties, so subtle and amazing that even under no circumstances could it be expressed by the most skillful hands.
Of the enterprises carried out by da Vinci on behalf of Louis Sforza, the colossal equestrian statue in memory of Francesca Sforza, cast in bronze, is especially remarkable. The first model of this monument accidentally broke. Leonardo da Vinci sculpted another, but the statue was not cast due to lack of money. When the French captured Milan in 1499, the model served as a target for the Gascon archers. Leonardo also created the famous Last Supper in Milan.
After the expulsion of Lodovico Sforza from Milan by the French in 1499, Leonardo left for Venice, visiting Mantua along the way, where he participated in the construction of defensive structures, and then returned to Florence; it is reported that he was so absorbed in mathematics that he did not even want to think about picking up a brush. For twelve years, Leonardo moved constantly from city to city, working for the famous Cesare Borgia in Romagna, designing fortifications (never built) for Piombino. In Florence he entered into rivalry with Michelangelo; This rivalry culminated in the enormous battle compositions that the two artists painted for the Palazzo della Signoria (also Palazzo Vecchio). Leonardo then conceived a second equestrian monument, which, like the first, was never created. All these years he continued to fill his notebooks with a variety of ideas on subjects as varied as the theory and practice of painting, anatomy, mathematics and the flight of birds. But in 1513, as in 1499, his patrons were expelled from Milan.
Leonardo went to Rome, where he spent three years under the patronage of the Medici. Depressed and upset by the lack of material for anatomical research, Leonardo tinkered with experiments and ideas that led nowhere.
The French, first Louis XII and then Francis I, admired the works of the Italian Renaissance, especially Leonardo's Last Supper. It is therefore not surprising that in 1516 Francis I, well aware of Leonardo's varied talents, invited him to the court, which was then located at the castle of Amboise in the Loire Valley. Although Leonardo worked on hydraulic projects and plans for the new royal palace, it is clear from the writings of the sculptor Benvenuto Cellini that his main occupation was the honorary position of court sage and advisor. On May 2, 1519, Leonardo dies in the arms of King Francis I, asking forgiveness from God and people for “not doing everything he could have done for art.” So we looked at short biography the great Italian painter of the Renaissance - Leonard da Vinci. The next chapter will examine the work of Leonard da Vinci as a painter.
2. The work of Leonardo da Vinci
2.1 Main periods in the painting of Leonardo da Vinci
The work of the great Italian painter can be divided into early, mature and late periods.
The first dated work (1473, Uffizi) is a small sketch of a river valley visible from a gorge; on one side there is a castle, on the other there is a wooded hillside. This sketch, made with quick strokes of the pen, testifies to the artist’s constant interest in atmospheric phenomena, about which he later wrote extensively in his notes. Landscape depicted from a high vantage point overlooking the floodplain was a common device in Florentine art in the 1460s (although it always served only as a background to the paintings). A silver pencil drawing of an ancient warrior in profile (mid-1470s, British Museum) demonstrates Leonardo's full maturity as a draftsman; it skillfully combines weak, flaccid and tense, elastic lines and attention to surfaces gradually modeled by light and shadow, creating a living, vibrant image.
The undated painting of the Annunciation (mid-1470s, Uffizi) was attributed to Leonardo only in the 19th century; perhaps it would be more correct to consider it as the result of a collaboration between Leonardo and Verrocchio. There are several weak points in it, for example, the perspective reduction of the building on the left is too sharp or the scale relationship between the figure of the Mother of God and the music stand is poorly developed in perspective. However, in other respects, especially in the subtle and soft modeling, as well as in the interpretation of the foggy landscape with a mountain vaguely looming in the background, the painting belongs to the hand of Leonardo; this can be inferred from a study of his later works. The question of whether the compositional idea belongs to him remains open. The colors, muted in comparison with the works of his contemporaries, anticipate the coloring of the artist’s later works.
Verrocchio's painting of the Baptism (Uffizi) is also undated, although it can presumably be placed in the first half of the 1470s. As noted in the first chapter, Giorgio Vasari, one of the first biographers of Leonardo, claims that he painted the figure of the left of the two angels, turned in profile. The angel's head is delicately modeled in light and shadow, with a soft and careful depiction of surface texture, contrasting with the more linear treatment of the angel on the right. It seems that Leonardo's involvement in this painting extended to include the misty river landscape and some parts of the figure of Christ, which are painted in oil, although tempera is used in other parts of the painting. This difference in technique suggests that Leonardo most likely completed the painting that Verrocchio did not finish; It is unlikely that the artists worked on it at the same time.
Portrait of Ginevra dei Benci (circa 1478, Washington, National Gallery) is perhaps the first painting Leonardo painted independently. The board was cut about 20 cm from the bottom, so that the crossed arms of the young woman disappeared (this is known from a comparison with surviving imitations of this painting). In this portrait, Leonardo does not seek to penetrate into the inner world of the model, however, as a demonstration of excellent mastery of soft, almost monochrome cut-off modeling, this picture has no equal. Behind you can see juniper branches (in Italian - ginevra) and a landscape shrouded in damp haze.
The Portrait of Ginevra dei Benci and Benoit's Madonna (St. Petersburg, Hermitage), preceded by a series of tiny sketches of the Madonna and Child, are probably the last paintings completed in Florence. The unfinished St. Jerome, very close in style to the Adoration of the Magi, can also be dated to around 1480. These paintings are contemporaneous with the first surviving sketches of military mechanisms. Having been trained as an artist, but striving to be a military engineer, Leonardo abandoned work on the Adoration of the Magi and set out in search of new tasks and a new life in Milan, where the mature period of his work began.
Despite the fact that Leonardo went to Milan in the hope of a career as an engineer, the first order he received in 1483 was the production of part of the altar image for the Chapel of the Immaculate Conception - Madonna in the Grotto (Louvre; attribution of Leonardo's brush to a later version from the London National Gallery disputed). A kneeling Mary looks at the Christ Child and baby John the Baptist, while an angel pointing at John looks at the viewer. The figures are arranged in a triangle in the foreground. It seems that the figures are separated from the viewer by a slight haze, the so-called sfumato (blurred and indistinct contours, soft shadow), which from now on becomes a characteristic feature of Leonardo’s painting . Behind them, in the semi-darkness of the cave, stalactites and stalagmites and slowly flowing waters shrouded in fog are visible. The landscape seems fantastic, but we should remember Leonardo's statement that painting is a science. As can be seen from the drawings contemporaneous with the painting, it was based on careful observations of geological phenomena. This also applies to the depiction of plants: you can not only identify them with a certain type, but also to see that Leonardo knew about the property of plants to turn towards the sun.
In the mid-1480s, Leonardo painted Lady with an Ermine (Cracow Museum), which may be a portrait of Lodovico Sforza's favorite Cecilia Gallerani. The contours of the figure of a woman with an animal are outlined by curved lines that are repeated throughout the composition, and this, combined with muted colors and delicate skin tones, creates the impression of ideal grace and beauty. The beauty of the Lady with an Ermine contrasts strikingly with the grotesque sketches of freaks in which Leonardo explored the extremes of anomalies in the facial structure.
In Milan, Leonardo began to take notes; around 1490 he focused on two disciplines: architecture and anatomy. He sketched several options for the design of a central-domed temple (an equal-pointed cross, the central part of which is covered by a dome) - a type of architectural structure that Alberti had previously recommended for the reason that it reflects one of the ancient types of temples and is based on the most perfect form - circle. Leonardo drew a plan and perspective views of the entire structure, which outlined the distribution of masses and the configuration of the internal space. Around this time, he obtained the skull and made a cross-section, opening the sinuses of the skull for the first time. The notes around the drawings indicate that he was primarily interested in the nature and structure of the brain. Of course, these drawings were intended for purely research purposes, but they are striking in their beauty and similarity to sketches of architectural projects in that both of them depict partitions separating parts of the internal space.
Two great paintings, “La Gioconda (Mona Lisa)” and “The Last Supper,” belong to Leonardo da Vinci’s mature period.
The Mona Lisa was created at a time when Leonardo was so absorbed in studying the structure of the female body, anatomy and problems associated with childbirth that it was almost impossible to separate his artistic and scientific interests. During these years, he sketched a human embryo in the uterus and created the last of several versions of Leda's painting on the subject ancient myth about the birth of Castor and Pollux from the union of the mortal girl Leda and Zeus, who took the form of a swan. Leonardo was studying comparative anatomy and was interested in the analogies between all organic forms.
Of all the sciences, Leonardo was most interested in anatomy and military affairs.
The most important of Leonardo's public orders was also related to war. In 1503, perhaps at the insistence of Niccolo Machiavelli, he received a commission for a fresco measuring approximately 6 by 15 m depicting the Battle of Anghiari for the Great Council Hall in the Palazzo della Signoria in Florence. In addition to this fresco, the Battle of Cascina, commissioned by Michelangelo, was to be depicted; both plots are heroic victories of Florence. This commission allowed the two artists to continue the intense rivalry that began in 1501. Neither fresco was completed, as both artists soon left Florence, Leonardo back to Milan and Michelangelo to Rome; the preparatory cardboards have not survived. In the center of Leonardo's composition (known from his sketches and copies of the central part, which was obviously completed by that time), there was an episode with the battle for the banner, where horsemen fiercely fight with swords, and fallen warriors lie under the feet of their horses. Judging by other sketches, the composition was supposed to consist of three parts, with the battle for the banner in the center. Since there is no clear evidence, surviving paintings by Leonardo and fragments of his notes suggest that the battle was depicted against the backdrop of a flat landscape with a mountain range on the horizon.
The late period of Leonardo da Vinci's work includes, first of all, several sketches for the plot of the Madonna and Child and St. Anna; This idea first arose in Florence. It is possible that the cardboard was created around 1505 (London, National Gallery), and in 1508 or a little later the painting, now in the Louvre, was created. Madonna sits on the lap of St. Anna and stretches out his hands to the Christ Child holding a lamb; free, rounded shapes of the figures, outlined by smooth lines, form a single composition.
John the Baptist (Louvre) depicts a man with a gentle smiling face that emerges from the semi-darkness of the background; he addresses the viewer with a prophecy about the coming of Christ.
The later series of drawings, the Flood (Windsor, Royal Library), depicts cataclysms, the power of tons of water, hurricane winds, rocks and trees turning into splinters in a whirlwind of a storm. The notes contain many passages about the Flood, some of them poetic, others dispassionately descriptive, others scientific research, in the sense that they treat such problems as the vortex movement of water in a whirlpool, its power and trajectory.
For Leonardo art and research activities were complementary aspects of the constant urge to observe and record appearance and the internal structure of the world. It can definitely be said that he was the first among scientists whose research was complemented by art.
Some seven thousand pages of Leonardo da Vinci's surviving manuscripts contain his thoughts on various issues of art, science and technology. From these notes the “Treatise on Painting” was later compiled. In particular, it sets out the doctrine of perspective, both linear and aerial. Leonardo writes: "... take a mirror, reflect a living object in it and compare the reflected object with your picture... you will see that a picture executed on a plane shows objects so that they appear convex, and a mirror on a plane makes the same thing; a picture is just a surface, and a mirror is the same; surrounded by shadow and light; both seem very far away on the other side of the surface. There is another perspective, which I call aerial, because due to the change in air, you can recognize different distances to different buildings, limited from below by a single (straight) line. . Make the first building... your color, make the more distant one more... blue, the one you want to be just as far back, make it just as much bluer..."
Unfortunately, many observations concerning the influence of transparent and translucent media on perceived color could not yet find a proper physical and mathematical explanation from Leonardo. However, valuable are the first experimental attempts made by the scientist to determine the intensity of light depending on the distance, to study the laws of binocular vision, seeing in them a condition for the perception of relief.
The Treatise on Painting also provides information about proportions. During the Renaissance, the mathematical concept of the golden proportion was elevated to the rank of main aesthetic principle. Leonardo da Vinci called it Sectio aurea, which is where the term “golden ratio” came from. According to Leonardo’s artistic canons, the golden proportion corresponds not only to the division of the body into two unequal parts by the waist line (the ratio of the larger part to the smaller is equal to the ratio of the whole to the larger part, this ratio is approximately equal to 1.618). The height of the face (to the roots of the hair) refers to the vertical distance between the arches of the eyebrows and the bottom of the chin, just as the distance between the bottom of the nose and the bottom of the chin refers to the distance between the corners of the lips and the bottom of the chin, this distance is equal to the golden ratio. Developing rules for depicting the human figure, Leonardo da Vinci tried to restore the so-called “square of the ancients” on the basis of literary information from antiquity. He made a drawing that shows that the span of a person’s outstretched arms is approximately equal to his height, as a result of which the human figure fits into a square and a circle.
2.2 The greatest works - "La Gioconda" and "The Last Supper"
2.2.1 "La Gioconda"
In Milan, Leonardo da Vinci began work on his famous painting"La Gioconda (Mona Lisa)". The background story of La Gioconda is as follows.
Francesco di Bartolomeo del Giocondo commissioned the great artist to paint a portrait of his third wife, 24-year-old Mona Lisa. The painting, measuring 97x53 cm, was completed in 1503 and immediately gained fame. The great artist wrote it for four years (he generally created his works for a long time). Evidence of this may be the use of various solvents during the writing period. Thus, the face of Mona Lisa, unlike her hands, is covered with a network of cracks. Francesco del Giocondo, for unknown reasons, did not buy this painting, and Leonardo did not part with it until the end of his life. The last years of his life, as noted above, the great artist spent the last years of his life in Paris at the invitation of the King of France Francis I. After his death on May 2, 1519, the king himself bought this painting.
When creating his masterpiece, the artist used a secret known to many portrait painters: the vertical axis of the canvas passes through the pupil of the left eye, which should cause a feeling of excitement in the viewer. The portrait (it is in the Louvre) is a further development of the type that appeared earlier in Leonardo: the model is depicted from the waist up, in a slight turn, the face is turned to the viewer, folded hands limit the composition from below. The inspired hands of Mona Lisa are as beautiful as the light smile on her face and the primordial rocky landscape in the foggy distance.
Gioconda is known as the image of a mysterious, even femme fatale, but this interpretation belongs to the 19th century.
The picture gives rise to various speculations. So in 1986, American artist and researcher Lillian Schwartz compared the image of the Mona Lisa with a self-portrait of Leonardo. Using an inverted image of a self-portrait, she used a computer to bring the paintings to the same scale so that the distance between the pupils became the same. It is believed that in doing so she obtained a striking resemblance, although this version seems quite controversial.
There is an opinion that the artist encrypted something in his painting and in particular in the famous smile of Gioconda. A barely noticeable movement of the lips and eyes fits into the correct circle, which is not in the paintings of Raphael, Michelangelo, or Botticelli - other geniuses of the Renaissance. The background of the “Madonnas” is just a dark wall with one and two window slots, respectively. In these paintings everything is clear: a mother looks at her child with love.
It is likely that for Leonardo this painting was the most complex and successful exercise in the use of sfumato, and the background of the painting is the result of his research in the field of geology. Regardless of whether the subject was secular or religious, landscapes that expose the “bones of the earth” are a recurring theme in Leonardo’s work. The artist embodied the secrets of Nature that constantly tormented the great Leonardo da Vinci in the all-penetrating gaze of Mona Lisa, directed as if from the depths of a dark cave. In confirmation of this are the words of Leonardo himself: “Submiting my greedy attraction, wanting to see the great variety of diverse and strange forms produced by skillful nature, wandering among the dark rocks, I approached the entrance to a large cave. For a moment I stopped in front of it, amazed... I I leaned forward to see what was happening there in the depths, but the great darkness prevented me. I stayed like that for some time. Suddenly two feelings awoke in me: fear and desire; something wonderful in its depths."
2.2.2 "Last Supper"
Leonardo's thoughts on space, linear perspective and the expression of various emotions in painting resulted in the creation of the fresco "The Last Supper", painted in an experimental technique on the far end wall of the refectory of the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan in 1495-1497.
In connection with The Last Supper, Vasari cites in his life story of Leonardo a funny episode that perfectly characterizes the artist’s style of work and his sharp tongue. Dissatisfied with Leonardo's slowness, the prior of the monastery insistently demanded that he finish his work as soon as possible. “It seemed strange to him to see that Leonardo stood immersed in thought for the whole half of the day. He wanted the artist not to let go of his brushes, just as one does not stop working in the garden. Not limiting himself to this, he complained to the Duke and so began to pester him, that he was forced to send for Leonardo and in a delicate manner ask him to take up the work, while making it clear in every possible way that he was doing all this at the insistence of the prior.” Having started a conversation with the Duke on general artistic topics, Leonardo then pointed out to him that he was close to finishing the painting and that he only had two heads left to paint - Christ and the traitor Judas. “He would like to look for this last head, but in the end, if he does not find anything better, he is ready to use the head of this same prior, so intrusive and immodest.” This remark made the Duke laugh very much, who told him that he was right a thousand times. Thus, the poor embarrassed prior continued to push on with the work in the garden and left Leonardo alone, who completed the head of Judas, which turned out to be the true embodiment of betrayal and inhumanity."
Leonardo prepared carefully and for a long time for the Milan painting. He completed many sketches in which he studied the poses and gestures of individual figures. “The Last Supper” attracted him not for its dogmatic content, but for the opportunity to unfold a great human drama before the viewer, show different characters, reveal the spiritual world of a person and accurately and clearly describe his experiences. He perceived the Last Supper as a scene of betrayal and set himself the goal of introducing into this traditional image that dramatic element, thanks to which it would acquire a completely new emotional sound.
While pondering the concept of “The Last Supper,” Leonardo not only made sketches, but also wrote down his thoughts about the actions of individual participants in this scene: “The one who drank and put the cup in its place turns his head to the speaker, the other connects the fingers of both hands and with frowning eyebrows looks at his companion, the other shows the palms of his hands, raises his shoulders to his ears and expresses surprise with his mouth..." The record does not indicate the names of the apostles, but Leonardo, apparently, clearly imagined the actions of each of them and the place to which each was called occupy in the overall composition. Refining poses and gestures in his drawings, he looked for forms of expression that would draw all the figures into a single whirlpool of passions. He wanted to capture living people in the images of the apostles, each of whom responds to the event in their own way.
"The Last Supper" is Leonardo's most mature and complete work. In this painting, the master avoids everything that could obscure the main course of the action he depicts; he achieves a rare convincingness of the compositional solution. In the center he places the figure of Christ, highlighting it with the opening of the door. He deliberately moves the apostles away from Christ in order to further emphasize his place in the composition. Finally, for the same purpose, he forces all perspective lines to converge at a point directly above the head of Christ. Leonardo divides his students into four symmetrical groups, full of life and movement. He makes the table small, and the refectory - strict and simple. This gives him the opportunity to focus the viewer’s attention on figures with enormous plastic power. All these techniques reflect the deep purposefulness of the creative plan, in which everything is weighed and taken into account.
The main task that Leonardo set himself in The Last Supper was to realistically convey the most complex mental reactions to the words of Christ: “One of you will betray me.” Giving complete human characters and temperaments in the images of the apostles, Leonardo forces each of them to react in their own way to the words spoken by Christ. It was this subtle psychological differentiation, based on the diversity of faces and gestures, that most amazed Leonardo’s contemporaries, especially when comparing his painting with earlier Florentine images on the same theme by Tadeo Gaddi, Andrea del Castagno, Cosimo Rosselli and Domenico Ghirlandaio. In all these masters, the apostles sit calmly, like extras, at the table, remaining completely indifferent to everything that happens. Not having sufficiently strong means in their arsenal to psychologically characterize Judas, Leonardo’s predecessors singled him out from general group apostles and placed in the form of a completely isolated figure in front of the table. Thus, Judas was artificially opposed to the entire congregation as an outcast and a villain. Leonardo boldly breaks this tradition. His artistic language is rich enough not to resort to such purely external effects. He unites Judas into one group with all the other apostles, but gives him such features that allow an attentive viewer to immediately recognize him among the twelve disciples of Christ.
Leonardo treats each of his students individually. Like a stone thrown into water, generating ever more divergent circles on the surface, the words of Christ, falling in the midst of dead silence, cause greatest movement in the assembly, which a minute before had been in a state of complete peace. Those three apostles who sit on his side respond especially impulsively to the words of Christ. left hand. They form an inextricable group, imbued with a single will and a single movement. Young Philip jumped up from his seat, addressing Christ with a bewildered question, James the elder threw up his hands in indignation and leaned back a little, Thomas raised his hand up, as if trying to understand what was happening. The group on the other side of Christ is imbued with a completely different spirit. Separated from the central figure by a significant interval, she is distinguished by incomparably greater restraint of gestures. Presented in a sharp turn, Judas convulsively clutches a purse of silver and looks at Christ with fear; his shadowed, ugly, rough profile is contrasted with the brightly lit, beautiful face of John, who limply lowered his head onto his shoulder and calmly folded his hands on the table. Peter's head is wedged between Judas and John; leaning towards John and leaning his left hand on his shoulder, he whispers something in his ear, while his right hand decisively grabbed the sword with which he wants to protect his teacher. The three other apostles sitting near Peter are turned in profile. Looking intently at Christ, they seem to ask him about the culprit of the betrayal. At the opposite end of the table is presented last group of three figures. Matthew, with his hands stretched out towards Christ, indignantly turns to the elderly Thaddeus, as if wanting to get an explanation from him of everything that is happening. However, the latter’s bewildered gesture clearly shows that he, too, remains in the dark.
It is not by chance that Leonardo depicted both extreme figures, sitting at the edges of the table, in pure profile. They close on both sides the movement coming from the center, fulfilling here the same role that belonged in the “Adoration of the Magi” to the figures of the old man and the young man, placed at the very edges of the picture. But if Leonardo’s psychological means of expression did not rise above the traditional level in this work of the early Florentine era, then in “The Last Supper” they achieve such perfection and depth, equal to which it would be in vain to look for anything else. Italian art XV century. And this was perfectly understood by the master’s contemporaries, who perceived Leonardo’s “Last Supper” as a new word in art.
The method of painting with oil paints turned out to be very short-lived. Just two years later, Leonardo was horrified to see his work changed so much. And ten years later, he and his students try to carry out the first restoration work. A total of eight restorations were made over the course of 300 years. In connection with these attempts, new layers of paint were repeatedly applied to the painting, significantly distorting the original. In addition, by the beginning of the 20th century, the feet of Jesus Christ were completely erased, since the constantly opening door of the dining room was in contact with this very place. The door was cut by monks to provide access to the dining room, but since it was made in the 1600s, it is a historical hole and there is no way to wall it up.
Milan is rightly proud of this masterpiece, which is the only Renaissance work of this magnitude. To no avail, two French kings dreamed of transporting the painting along with the wall to Paris. Napoleon also did not remain indifferent to this idea. But to the great joy of the Milanese and all of Italy, this unique work of the great genius remained in its place. During World War II, when British aircraft bombed Milan, the roof and three walls of the famous building were completely demolished. And only the one on which Leonardo painted his painting remained standing. It was a real miracle!
For a long time, this brilliant work was under restoration. To reconstruct the work, the latest technologies were used, which made it possible to gradually remove layer by layer. In this way, centuries of hardened dust, mold and all sorts of other foreign materials were removed. Moreover, let's face it, 1/3 or even half of the original colors were lost over the course of 500 years. But the general appearance of the painting has changed significantly. She seemed to come to life, sparkling with cheerful, lively colors that the great master had given her. And finally, in the spring of May 26, 1999, after a restoration that lasted 21 years, the work of Leonardo da Vinci was again open to public viewing. On this occasion, a big celebration was held in the city, and a concert was held in the church.
To protect this delicate work from damage, a constant temperature and humidity are maintained in the building through special filtering devices. Entry is limited to 25 people every 15 minutes.
Thus, in this chapter we examined Leonardo da Vinci as a creator - painter, sculptor, architect. The next chapter will examine him as a scientist and inventor.
3. Leonardo da Vinci - scientist and inventor
3.1 Leonardo da Vinci's contributions to science
Da Vinci made his greatest contribution to the field of mechanics. Leonardo Da Vinci is the author of studies on the fall of a body on an inclined plane, on the centers of gravity of pyramids, on the impact of bodies, on the movement of sand on sounding records; about the laws of friction. Leonardo also wrote essays on hydraulics.
Some historians whose research dates back to the Renaissance have expressed the opinion that although Leonardo da Vinci was talented in many fields, he nevertheless did not make significant contributions to such an exact science as theoretical mechanics. However, a careful analysis of his recently discovered manuscripts and especially the drawings contained in them convinces us of the opposite. Leonardo da Vinci's work on the effects of various types of weapons, in particular the crossbow, appears to have been one of the reasons for his interest in mechanics. His subjects of interest in this area, speaking modern language, there were laws of addition of velocities and addition of forces, the concept of a neutral plane and the position of the center of gravity during body movement.
Leonardo da Vinci's contribution to theoretical mechanics can be appreciated to a greater extent by a more careful study of his drawings, rather than the texts of the manuscripts and the mathematical calculations contained in them.
Let's start with an example reflecting Leonardo da Vinci's persistent attempts to solve problems related to improving the design of weapons (never completely solved), which aroused his interest in the laws of addition of velocities and addition of forces. Despite the rapid development of gunpowder weapons during the life of Leonardo da Vinci, the bow, crossbow and spear continued to be common types of weapons. Leonardo da Vinci paid especially much attention to such ancient weapons as the crossbow. It often happens that the design of a particular system reaches perfection only after descendants become interested in it, and the process of improving this system can lead to fundamental scientific results.
Fruitful experimental work to improve crossbows had been carried out earlier, before Leonardo da Vinci. For example, shortened arrows began to be used in crossbows, which had approximately 2 times better aerodynamic characteristics than conventional bow arrows. In addition, a beginning was made to study the basic principles underlying crossbow shooting.
In an effort not to be limited by traditional design solutions, Leonardo da Vinci considered a crossbow design that would allow only the tip of the arrow to be fired, leaving its shaft motionless. Apparently, he understood that by reducing the mass of the projectile it was possible to increase its initial speed.
In some of his crossbow designs, he proposed the use of several arcs, acting either simultaneously or sequentially. IN the latter case the largest and most massive arc would power a smaller and lighter arc, and that in turn would power an even smaller one, etc. The arrow would be fired on the last arc. It is obvious that Leonardo da Vinci considered this process from the point of view of adding speeds. For example, he notes that the firing range of a crossbow will be maximum if you shoot while galloping from a galloping horse and lean forward at the moment of the shot. This would not actually result in a significant increase in arrow speed. However, Leonardo da Vinci's ideas were directly relevant to the growing debate over whether an infinite increase in speed was possible. Later, scientists began to incline to the conclusion that this process has no limit. This point of view existed until Einstein put forward his postulate, from which it followed that no body can move at a speed exceeding the speed of light. However, at speeds much lower than the speed of light, the law of addition of speeds (based on Galileo’s principle of relativity) remains valid.
The law of addition of forces, or parallelogram of forces, was discovered after Leonardo da Vinci. This law is discussed in the branch of mechanics that helps answer the question of what happens when two or more forces interact at different angles.
When making a crossbow, it is important to achieve symmetry of the forces occurring in each wing. Otherwise, the arrow may move out of its groove when fired, and the shooting accuracy will be impaired. Usually, crossbowmen, preparing their weapons for shooting, checked whether the bend of the wings of its arc was the same. Today all bows and crossbows are tested in this way. The weapon is hung on the wall so that its bowstring is horizontal and the arc with its convex part is facing upward. Various weights are suspended from the middle of the bowstring. Each weight causes a certain bend in the arc, which allows you to check the symmetry of the action of the wings. The easiest way to do this is to observe whether, as the load increases, the center of the string drops vertically or moves away from it.
This method may have given Leonardo da Vinci the idea of using diagrams (found in the Madrid Manuscripts) in which the displacement of the ends of the arc (taking into account the position of the center of the bowstring) is represented as a function of the size of the suspended weight. He understood that the force required for the arc to begin to bend was small at first and increased with increasing mixing of the ends of the arc. (This phenomenon is based on a law formulated much later by Robert Hooke: the absolute amount of mixing as a result of deformation of a body is proportional to the applied force).
Leonardo da Vinci called the relationship between the displacement of the ends of the crossbow's arc and the size of the load suspended from the bowstring "pyramidal", since, just as in a pyramid, the opposite sides diverge as they move away from the intersection point, so this dependence becomes more and more noticeable as the ends of the arc are displaced. Noting the change in the position of the bowstring depending on the size of the load, he, however, noticed nonlinearities. One of them was that, although the displacement of the ends of the arc depended linearly on the size of the load, there was no linear relationship between the displacement of the bowstring and the size of the load. Based on this observation, Leonardo da Vinci apparently tried to find an explanation for the fact that in some crossbows the bowstring, when released after applying a certain amount of force to it, initially moves faster than when approaching its original position.
Such nonlinearity may have been observed when using crossbows with poorly made arcs. It is likely that Leonardo da Vinci's conclusions were based on faulty reasoning rather than calculations, although he did resort to calculations on occasion. However, this task sparked his deep interest in analyzing crossbow design. Is it true that an arrow that quickly picks up speed at the beginning of the shot begins to move faster than the bowstring and breaks away from it before the bowstring returns to its original position?
Without a clear understanding of such concepts as inertia, force and acceleration, Leonardo da Vinci naturally could not find a definitive answer to this question. On the pages of his manuscript there are arguments of the opposite nature: in some of them he is inclined to answer this question positively, in others - negatively. Leonardo da Vinci's interest in this problem led him to further attempts to improve the design of the crossbow. This suggests that he intuitively guessed the existence of a law, which later became known as the “law of addition of forces.”
Leonardo da Vinci did not limit himself only to the problem of the speed of movement of the arrow and the action of tension forces in the crossbow. For example, he was also interested in whether the range of an arrow would double if the weight of the crossbow arc was doubled. If we measure the total weight of all arrows placed one after another end to end and forming a continuous line, the length of which is equal to the maximum flight distance, will this weight be equal to the force with which the bowstring acts on the arrow? Sometimes Leonardo da Vinci really looked deeply, for example, in search of an answer to the question, does the vibration of the bowstring immediately after the shot indicate a loss of energy in the arc?
As a result, in the Madrid Manuscript, regarding the relationship between the force on the arc and the displacement of the bowstring, Leonardo da Vinci states: “The force that forces the crossbow string to move increases as the angle at the center of the bowstring decreases.” The fact that this statement does not appear anywhere else in his notes may mean that this conclusion was reached by him definitively. Undoubtedly, he used it in numerous attempts to improve the design of the crossbow with the so-called block arches.
Block arches, in which the bowstring is passed through blocks, are known to modern archers. These arcs allow the arrow to fly at high speeds. The laws underlying their operation are now well known. Leonardo da Vinci did not have the same complete understanding of the action of block bows, but he invented crossbows in which the bowstring was passed through blocks. In his crossbows, the blocks usually had a rigid mount: they did not move with the ends of the arc, as in modern crossbows and bows. Therefore, the arc in the design of Leonardo da Vinci's crossbow did not have the same effect as in modern block arcs. One way or another, Leonardo da Vinci apparently intended to make an arc, the design of which would solve the “string-angle” problem, i.e. an increase in the force acting on the arrow would be achieved by reducing the angle at the center of the bowstring. In addition, he tried to reduce energy loss when firing a crossbow.
In the basic design of Leonardo da Vinci's crossbow, a very flexible arc was mounted on a frame. Some drawings show that with the maximum tension on the bowstring, the arc bent almost into a circle. From the ends of the arc, the string on each side was passed through a pair of blocks mounted in front of the frame next to the arrow guide groove, and then went to the release device.
Leonardo da Vinci apparently did not give an explanation of his design anywhere, but its diagram appears repeatedly in his drawings along with the image of a crossbow (also with a strongly curved arc), in which the stretched bowstring running from the ends of the arc to the trigger device has a V -shape.
It seems most likely that Leonardo da Vinci sought to minimize the angle at the center of the bowstring so that the arrow would receive greater acceleration when fired. It is possible that he also used blocks to ensure that the angle between the bowstring and the wings of the crossbow remained close to 90° for as long as possible. An intuitive understanding of the law of addition of forces helped him radically change the time-tested design of a crossbow based on the quantitative relationship between the energy “stored” in the arc of the crossbow and the speed of the arrow. He undoubtedly had an idea of the mechanical efficiency of his design and tried to improve it further.
Leonardo da Vinci's block bow was apparently impractical, since the sudden tension of the bowstring caused it to bend significantly. Only composite arches made in a special way could withstand such significant deformation.
Compound arcs were used during Leonardo da Vinci's lifetime and may have sparked his interest in the problem that led him to the idea of what is called the neutral plane. The study of this problem was also associated with a more in-depth study of the behavior of materials under mechanical stress.
In a typical compound bow used during the era of Leonardo da Vinci, the outer and inner sides of the crossbow wings were made of different materials. The inner side, which experienced compression, was usually made of horn, and the outer side, which experienced tension, was usually made of tendons. Each of these materials is stronger than wood. A layer of wood was used between the outer and inner sides of the arc, strong enough to give rigidity to the wings. The wings of such an arc could be bent more than 180°. Leonardo da Vinci had some idea of how such an arc was made, and the problem of choosing materials that could withstand high tension and compression may have led him to a deep understanding of how stresses were generated in a given structure.
In two small drawings (discovered in the Madrid Manuscript) he depicted a flat spring in two states - deformed and undeformed. In the center of the deformed spring, he drew two parallel lines, symmetrical about the central point. When the spring is bent, these lines diverge on the convex side and converge on the concave side.
These drawings are accompanied by a caption in which Leonardo da Vinci notes that when a spring is bent, the convex part becomes thicker and the concave part becomes thinner. "This modification is pyramidal and therefore will never change at the center of the spring." In other words, the distance between the initially parallel lines will increase at the top as it decreases at the bottom. The central part of the spring serves as a kind of balance between the two sides and represents the zone where the tension is zero, i.e. neutral plane. Leonardo da Vinci also understood that both tension and compression increase in proportion to the distance to the neutral zone.
From the drawings of Leonardo da Vinci it is clear that the idea of a neutral plane arose in him when studying the action of a crossbow. An example is his drawing of a giant rock-shooting catapult. The arc of this weapon was bent using a screw gate; the stone flew out of a pocket located in the center of the double bowstring. Both the collar and the stone pocket are drawn (to a larger scale) the same as in the crossbow drawings. However, Leonardo da Vinci apparently realized that increasing the size of the arc would lead to complex problems. Judging by Leonardo da Vinci's drawings of the neutral zone, he knew that (for a given angle of flexion) the stresses in the arch increased in proportion to its thickness. To prevent stresses from reaching a critical value, he changed the design of the giant arc. The front (front) part of it, which was in tension, according to his ideas, should be made of a solid log, and its rear part (rear), which was in compression, should be made of separate blocks fixed behind the front part. The shape of these blocks was such that they could come into contact with each other only when the arc was bent at its maximum. This design, as well as others, shows that Leonardo da Vinci believed that tensile and compressive forces should be considered separately from each other. In the manuscript of his Treatise on the Flight of Birds and his other writings, Leonardo da Vinci notes that the stability of a bird's flight is achieved only when its center of gravity is in front of the center of resistance (the point at which the pressure in front and behind is equal). This functional principle, used by Leonardo da Vinci in the theory of bird flight, is still important in the theory of flight of airplanes and rockets.
3.2 Leonardo da Vinci's inventions
The inventions and discoveries made by da Vinci cover all areas of knowledge (there are more than 50 of them), completely anticipating the main directions of development of modern civilization. Let's talk about just a few of them. In 1499, Leonardo, for a meeting in Milan with the French king Louis XII, designed a wooden mechanical lion, which, after taking a few steps, opened its chest and showed its insides “filled with lilies.” The scientist is the inventor of a spacesuit, a submarine, a steamship, and flippers. He has a manuscript that shows the possibility of diving to great depths without a spacesuit thanks to the use of a special gas mixture (the secret of which he deliberately destroyed). To invent it, it was necessary to have a good understanding of the biochemical processes of the human body, which were completely unknown at that time! It was he who first proposed installing batteries of firearms on armored ships (he gave the idea of a battleship!), invented a helicopter, a bicycle, a glider, a parachute, a tank, a machine gun, poisonous gases, a smoke screen for troops, a magnifying glass (100 years before Galileo!). Da Vinci invented textile machines, weaving machines, machines for making needles, powerful cranes, systems for draining swamps through pipes, and arched bridges. He creates drawings of gates, levers and screws designed to lift enormous weights - mechanisms that did not exist in his time. It is amazing that Leonardo describes these machines and mechanisms in detail, although they were impossible to make at that time due to the fact that ball bearings were not known at that time (but Leonardo himself knew this - the corresponding drawing has been preserved).
Leonardo da Vinci invented the dynamometer, odometer, some blacksmith tools, and a lamp with double air flow.
In astronomy, the most significant are the advanced cosmological ideas of Leonardo da Vinci: the principle of the physical homogeneity of the Universe, the denial of the central position of the Earth in space, for the first time he correctly explained the ashen color of the Moon.
Aircraft stand out as a separate line in this series of inventions.
In front of the entrance to Rome's Fiumicino International Airport, named after Leonardo da Vinci, stands a huge bronze statue. It depicts a great scientist with a model of a rotorcraft - the prototype of a helicopter. But this is not the only aviation invention that Leonardo gave to the world. In the margins of the previously mentioned “Treatise on the Flight of Birds” from da Vinci’s collection of scientific works “Codex Madrid” there is a strange author’s drawing that only relatively recently attracted close attention researchers. It turned out that this is a sketch of a drawing of another “flying machine” that Leonardo dreamed of 500 years ago. Moreover, as experts were convinced, this is the only device of all the devices conceived by the genius of the Renaissance that was truly capable of lifting a person into the air. “Feather,” that’s what Leonardo called his device.
The famous Italian athlete and traveler Angelo D'Arrigo, a 42-year-old free-flight champion, saw Leonardo da Vinci in the drawing with an experienced eye real prototype modern hang glider and decided not only to recreate it, but also to test it. Angelo himself has been studying the life and routes of migratory birds for many years, often accompanies them on a sports hang glider, turning into their companion, into a kind of “bird man”, that is, he puts into practice the cherished dream of Leonardo and many generations of naturalists.
Last year, for example, he made a 4,000 km flight together with Siberian cranes, and this coming spring he plans to fly a hang glider over Everest, following the route of Tibetan eagles. It took D'Arrigo two years of hard work to, together with professional engineers and technicians, realize the “artificial wings” in material, first on a scale of 1:5, and then in life-size, thus reproducing Leonardo’s idea. An elegant structure was built, consisting of thin, ultra-light and durable aluminum tubes and synthetic Dacron fabric in the form of a sail. The result is a trapezoid-shaped structure, very reminiscent of the open wings invented by specialists of the American space agency NASA in the 60s for a smooth return from orbit of the Gemini descent capsules. Angelo first checked all the calculations on a computer flight simulator and on a stand, and then he himself tested the new device in the wind tunnel of the FIAT aircraft manufacturing workshops in Orbassano (15 km from Turin, Piedmont region) At a conventional speed of 35 km per hour “Peryshko”. Leonardo smoothly lifted off the floor and soared in the air with his pilot-passenger for two hours. “I realized that I had proven the teacher right,” the pilot admits in shock. So, the great Florentine’s brilliant intuition did not deceive him. Who knows, if the maestro had used lighter materials (and not just wood and homespun canvas), humanity might have celebrated this year not the centenary of aeronautics, but its five hundredth anniversary. And it is not known how civilization on Earth would have developed if " homo sapiens“could see my small and fragile cradle from a bird’s eye view half a thousand years earlier.
From now on, the current model "Feather" will take pride of place in the history of aircraft section of the National Museum of Science and Technology in Milan, not far from the monastery and temple of Santa Maria delle Grazie, where Leonardo da Vinci's fresco "The Last Supper" is kept.
In the skies over Surrey (Great Britain), prototypes of a modern hang glider, assembled exactly according to the drawings of the brilliant painter, scientist and engineer of the Renaissance, were successfully tested.
Test flights from the Surrey hills were carried out by two-time world hang gliding champion Judy Liden. She managed to lift da Vinci's "proto-hang glider" to a maximum height of 10 m and stay in the air for 17 seconds. This was enough to prove that the device actually worked. The flights were carried out as part of an experimental television project. The device was recreated based on drawings familiar to the whole world by 42-year-old mechanic from Bedfordshire, Steve Roberts. A medieval hang glider resembles the skeleton of a bird from above. It is made from Italian poplar, cane, animal tendon and flax, treated with a glaze derived from beetle secretions. The flying machine itself was far from perfect. “It was almost impossible to control it. I was flying where the wind was blowing, and I couldn’t do anything about it. The tester of the first car in history probably felt the same way,” Judy said.
The second hang glider, built for Channel 4, used several designs from the great Leonardo: a control wheel and trapeze, which Leonardo later invented, were added to the 1487 drawing. "My first reaction was surprise. His beauty simply amazed me," says Judy Liden. The hang glider flew a distance of 30 meters at a height of 15 meters.
Before Liden flew the hang glider, it was placed on a test bench at the University of Liverpool. “The main problem is stability,” says Professor Gareth Padfield. “They did the right thing by carrying out bench tests. Our pilot fell several times. This device is very difficult to control.”
According to BBC science series producer Michael Mosley, the reason the hang glider cannot fly flawlessly is because Leonardo did not want his inventions to be used for military purposes. “By building the machines he designed and discovering the errors, we felt they were made for a reason. Our hypothesis is that Leonardo, a pacifist who had to work for the military leaders of that era, deliberately introduced erroneous information into his designs.” As evidence, there is a note on the back of a drawing of a diving respirator: “By knowing how the human heart works, they can learn to kill people under water.”
3.3 Leonardo Da Vinci's predictions
Leonardo da Vinci practiced special psychotechnical exercises, dating back to the esoteric practices of the Pythagoreans and... modern neurolinguistics, in order to sharpen his perception of the world, improve memory and develop imagination. He seemed to know the evolutionary keys to the secrets of the human psyche, which was still far from being realized in modern man. Thus, one of Leonardo da Vinci’s secrets was a special sleep formula: he slept for 15 minutes every 4 hours, thus reducing his daily sleep from 8 to 1.5 hours. Thanks to this, the genius immediately saved 75 percent of his sleep time, which actually extended his life from 70 to 100 years! In the esoteric tradition, similar techniques have been known since time immemorial, but they have always been considered so secret that, like other psychic and mnemonic techniques, they have never been made public.
And he was also an excellent magician (contemporaries spoke more frankly - a magician). Leonardo could create a multicolored flame from a boiling liquid by pouring wine into it; easily turns white wine into red; with one blow he breaks a cane, the ends of which are placed on two glasses, without breaking either of them; puts a little of his saliva on the end of the pen - and the inscription on the paper turns black. The miracles that Leonardo shows so impress his contemporaries that he is seriously suspected of serving “black magic.” In addition, near the genius there are always strange, dubious personalities, like Tomaso Giovanni Masini, known under the pseudonym Zoroaster de Peretola, a good mechanic, jeweler and at the same time an adept of the secret sciences.
Leonardo kept a very strange diary, addressing himself as “you” in it, giving instructions and orders to himself as a servant or slave: “order me to show you...”, “you must show in your essay...”, “order make two travel bags..." One gets the impression that there were, as it were, two personalities living in da Vinci: one - well-known, friendly, not without some human weaknesses, and the other - incredibly strange, secretive, unknown to anyone, who commanded him and controlled his actions.
Da Vinci had the ability to foresee the future, which, apparently, even surpassed the prophetic gift of Nostradamus. His famous "Prophecies" (originally a series of notes made in Milan in 1494) paint frightening pictures of the future, many of which were either already our past or are now our present. “People will talk to each other from the most distant countries and answer each other” - we are undoubtedly talking about the telephone. “People will walk and not move, they will talk to someone who is not there, they will hear someone who does not speak” - television, tape recording, sound reproduction. “People... will instantly scatter to different parts of the world without moving from their place” - broadcast of a television image.
“You will see yourself falling from great heights without any harm to you” - obviously skydiving. “Countless lives will be destroyed, and countless holes will be made in the ground” - here, most likely, the seer is talking about craters from aerial bombs and shells, which actually destroyed countless lives. Leonardo even foresees travel into space: “And many land and water animals will rise between the stars...” - the launch of living beings into space. “Many will be those from whom their little children will be taken away, who will be skinned and quartered in the most cruel way!” - a clear indication of the children whose body parts are used in the organ bank.
Thus, the personality of Leonardo da Vinci is unique and multifaceted. He was not only a man of art, but also a man of science.
Conclusion
Most people know Leonardo da Vinci as the creator of immortal artistic masterpieces. But for Leonardo, art and exploration were complementary aspects of the constant quest to observe and record the external appearance and internal workings of the world. It can definitely be said that he was the first among scientists whose research was complemented by art.
Leonardo worked very hard. Now it seems to us that everything was easy for him. But no, his fate was filled with eternal doubts and routine. He worked all his life and could not imagine any other state. Rest for him was a change of activity and a four-hour sleep. He created always and everywhere. “If everything seems easy, this unmistakably proves that the worker is very little skilled and that the work is beyond his understanding,” Leonardo repeatedly repeated to his students.
If you look around the vast space of areas of science and human knowledge touched by Leonardo’s thought, it will become clear that huge amount discoveries and not even the fact that many of them were years ahead of their time, making him immortal. The main thing in his work remains that his genius in science is the birth of the era of experience.
Leonardo da Vinci is the brightest representative of the new, experimentally based natural science. “Simple and pure experience is the true teacher,” the scientist wrote. He studies not only the machines that existed in his time, but also turns to the mechanics of the ancients. Persistently, carefully examines individual parts of machines, carefully measures and records everything in search best shape, both parts and the whole. He is convinced that ancient scientists were just approaching an understanding of the basic laws of mechanics. He sharply criticizes the scholastic sciences, contrasting them with the harmonious combination of experiment and theory: “I know well that some proud people, because I am not well-read, will think that they have the right to blame me, citing the fact that I am a person without a book education. Stupid people !. I could answer them like this, saying: “You, who have adorned yourself with the works of others, you do not want to recognize my rights to my own”... They do not know that my objects are drawn from more than from other people’s words. experience, which was the mentor of those who wrote well; so I take him as my mentor and will refer to him in all cases.” As a practical scientist, Leonardo da Vinci enriched almost all branches of knowledge with deep observations and insightful guesses.
This is the biggest mystery. As you know, answering it, some modern researchers consider Leonardo a message from alien civilizations, others - a time traveler from the distant future, and still others - an inhabitant of a parallel world, more developed than ours. It seems that the last assumption is the most plausible: da Vinci knew too well the worldly affairs and the future that awaited humanity, about which he himself was little concerned...
Literature
1. Batkin L.M. Leonardo da Vinci and the features of Renaissance creative thinking. M., 1990.
2. Vasari G. Biography of Leonardo da Vinci, Florentine painter and sculptor. M., 1989.
3. Gastev A.L. Leonardo da Vinci. M., 1984.
4. Gelb, M. J. Learn to think and draw like Leonardo da Vinci. M., 1961.
5. Gukovsky M.A., Leonardo da Vinci, L. - M., 1967.
6. Zubov V.P., Leonardo da Vinci, M. - L., 1961.
8. Lazarev V.N. Leonardo da Vinci. L. - M., 1952.
9. Foley W. Werner S. The contribution of Leonardo da Vinci to theoretical mechanics. // Science and life. 1986-№11.
10. The mechanical investigations of Leonardo da Vinci, Berk. -Los Ang., 1963.
11. Heydenreich L. H., Leonardo architetto. Firenze, 1963.
Application
Leonardo da Vinci – self-portrait
Last Supper
Gioconda (Mona Lisa)
Lady with an ermine
Baby in the womb - anatomical drawing
Leonardo da Vinci - Anatomical drawings:
Human heart - anatomical drawing
Oddly enough, only one invention of da Vinci received recognition during his lifetime - a wheel lock for a pistol that was wound with a key. At first this mechanism was not widespread, but by mid-16th century century, gained popularity among nobles, especially in the cavalry, which was even reflected in the design of the armor: Maximilian armor began to be made with gloves instead of mittens for the sake of shooting pistols. The wheel lock for a pistol, invented by Leonardo da Vinci, was so perfect that it continued to be found in the 19th century.
But, as often happens, recognition of geniuses comes centuries later: many of his inventions were expanded and modernized, and are now used in everyday life.
For example, Leonardo da Vinci created a device that could compress air and force it through pipes. This invention has a very wide range of applications: from lighting stoves to... ventilation of rooms.
Leonardo is not the first scientist who was interested in the possibility of a person remaining under water for a long time. For example, Leon Battista Alberti planned to raise some Roman ships from the bottom of Lake Nemi. Leonardo went further than just plans: he created a design for a diving suit, which was made of waterproof leather.
It was supposed to have a large chest pocket, which was filled with air to increase volume, making it easier for the diver to rise to the surface. Leonardo's diver was equipped with a flexible breathing tube that connected his helmet to a protective floating dome on the surface of the water (preferably made of reeds with leather joints).
It is well known that Leonardo da Vinci also developed a drawing of the “ancestor” of the modern helicopter. The radius of the propeller was supposed to be 4.8 m. According to the scientist’s plan, it had a metal edging and a linen covering. The screw was driven by people who walked around the axis and pushed the levers. “I think that if this screw mechanism is well made, that is, made of starched linen (to avoid tears) and quickly untwisted, then it will find support in the air and fly high into the air,” wrote da Vinci in his works.
One of the most necessary things for teaching a person to swim is a lifebuoy. This invention of Leonardo remained virtually unchanged.
To speed up swimming, the scientist developed a design of webbed gloves, which over time turned into the well-known flippers.
It’s hard to believe, but to make the work of workers easier, Leonardo came up with... excavators, which were more likely designed for lifting and transporting dug material than for digging as such. Scientists suggest that excavators could be needed for the Arno River diversion project. It was planned to dig a ditch 18m wide and 6m long.
The inventor's drawings give an idea of the size of the machine and the canal that had to be dug. The crane, with booms of different lengths, was interesting because it could be used with multiple counterweights on two or more excavation levels. The crane's booms swiveled 180° and covered the entire width of the channel. The excavator was mounted on rails and, as work progressed, moved forward using a screw mechanism on the central rail.
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One of Leonardo's most famous drawings represents the ancient development of the automobile. The self-propelled cart had to be propelled by a complex crossbow mechanism that would transmit energy to drives connected to the steering wheel. The rear wheels had differentiated drives and could move independently. The fourth wheel is connected to a steering wheel, with which you can steer the cart.
Initially this vehicle intended for the amusement of the royal court and belonged to that series of self-propelled machines that were created by other engineers of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
Humanity is only now daring to try some of the scientist’s inventions: for example, in the Norwegian town of As in 2001, a 100-meter pedestrian bridge designed by Leonardo da Vinci was opened. This was the first time in 500 years when the architectural project of the Master, who was far ahead of his time, received a real embodiment...
Leonardo da Vinci designed this structure for the Turkish Sultan: the bridge was to span the Golden Horn Bay in Istanbul. If the project were implemented, this bridge would be the most long bridge of its time - its length was 346 meters. However, Leonardo failed to implement his project - Sultan Bayazet II refused the proposals of the Florentine artist.
True, the new bridge is inferior to its medieval prototype in length - 100 m instead of 346 - but it exactly repeats all the design and aesthetic advantages of Leonardo's project. This bridge serves as a pedestrian crossing at a height of 8 m above the E-18 motorway, 35 km south of Oslo. During its construction, it was necessary to sacrifice only one idea of Leonardo da Vinci - as building material wood was used, whereas 500 years ago the bridge was planned to be built from stone.
In 2002, one of the inventions of the great Leonardo da Vinci was also recreated in the UK: a prototype of a modern hang glider, assembled exactly according to his drawings, was successfully tested in the skies over Surrey.
Test flights from the Surrey hills were carried out by two-time world hang gliding champion Judy Liden. She managed to lift da Vinci’s “proto-hang glider” to a maximum height of 10 m and stay in the air for 17 seconds. This was enough to prove that the device actually worked.
The flights were carried out as part of an experimental television project. The device was recreated based on drawings familiar to the whole world by 42-year-old mechanic from Bedfordshire, Steve Roberts.
A medieval hang glider resembles the skeleton of a bird from above. It is made from Italian poplar, cane, animal tendon and flax, treated with a glaze derived from beetle secretions.
The flying machine itself was far from perfect. “It was almost impossible to control her. I flew where the wind was blowing and couldn't do anything about it. The tester of the first car in history probably felt the same way,” Judy said.
As Leonardo da Vinci believed, “if a person has an awning made of thick fabric, each side of which is 12 arm lengths, and the height is 12, then he can jump from any significant height without breaking.” He himself was not able to test this device, however, in December 2000, British parachutist Adrian Nicholas in South Africa descended from a height of 3 thousand meters from a hot air balloon on a parachute made according to a sketch by Leonardo da Vinci. The descent was successful.
Today is Leonardo da Vinci's birthday. Scientist, inventor, writer, musicianLeonardo di ser Piero da Vinci - a man of Renaissance art, sculptor, inventor, painter, philosopher, writer, scientist, polymath (universal person).
The future genius was born as a result of a love affair between the noble Piero da Vinci and the girl Katerina (Katarina). According to the social norms of that time, the marriage of these people was impossible due to the low origin of Leonardo’s mother. After the birth of her first child, she was married to a potter, with whom Katerina lived the rest of her life. It is known that she gave birth to four daughters and a son from her husband.
Portrait of Leonardo da Vinci
The parent apprenticed Leonardo to the Tuscan master Andrea Verrocchio. During his studies with his mentor, son Pierrot learned not only the art of painting and sculpture. Young Leonardo studied the humanities and engineering, leather craftsmanship, and the basics of working with metal and chemicals. All this knowledge was useful to Da Vinci in life.
Leonardo received confirmation of his qualifications as a master at the age of twenty, after which he continued to work under the supervision of Verrocchio. The young artist was involved in minor work on his teacher’s paintings, for example, he painted background landscapes and clothes minor characters. Leonardo only got his own workshop in 1476.
Drawing "Vitruvian Man" by Leonardo da Vinci
In 1482, da Vinci was sent by his patron Lorenzo de' Medici to Milan. In Milan, Duke Lodovico Sforza enrolled Leonardo in the court staff as an engineer. The high-ranking person was interested in defensive devices and devices for entertaining the courtyard. Da Vinci had the opportunity to develop his talent as an architect and his abilities as a mechanic. His inventions turned out to be an order of magnitude better than those proposed by his contemporaries.
The engineer stayed in Milan under Duke Sforza for about seventeen years. At this time, Leonardo created his most famous drawing, “The Vitruvian Man,” made a clay model of the equestrian monument of Francesco Sforza, painted the wall of the refectory of the Dominican monastery with the composition “The Last Supper,” and made a number of anatomical sketches and drawings of apparatus.
Leonardo's engineering talent also came in handy after his return to Florence in 1499. He entered the service of Duke Cesare Borgia, who relied on Da Vinci's ability to create military mechanisms. The engineer worked in Florence for about seven years, after which he returned to Milan. By that time, he had already completed work on his most famous painting, which is now kept in the Louvre Museum.
The master's second Milanese period lasted six years, after which he left for Rome. In 1516, Leonardo went to France, where he spent his last years. On the journey, the master took with him Francesco Melzi, a student and main heir artistic style da Vinci.
Portrait of Francesco Melzi
Despite the fact that Leonardo spent only four years in Rome, it is in this city that there is a museum named after him. In three halls of the institution you can get acquainted with devices built according to Leonardo’s drawings, examine copies of paintings, photos of diaries and manuscripts.
The Italian devoted most of his life to engineering and architectural projects. His inventions were both military and peaceful in nature. Leonardo is known as the developer of tank prototypes, aircraft, self-propelled carriage, searchlight, catapult, bicycle, parachute, mobile bridge, machine gun. Some of the inventor's drawings still remain a mystery to researchers.
Drawings and sketches of some of Leonardo da Vinci's inventions
In 2009, the Discovery TV channel aired the series of films “Da Vinci Apparatus.” Each of the ten episodes of the documentary series was devoted to the construction and testing of mechanisms based on Leonardo's original drawings. The film's technicians tried to recreate the inventions of the Italian genius using materials from his era.
Modern researchers have concluded that the probable cause of the artist’s death was a stroke. Da Vinci died at the age of 67 in 1519. Thanks to the memoirs of his contemporaries, it is known that by that time the artist was already suffering from partial paralysis. Leonardo could not move his right hand, as researchers believe, due to a stroke suffered in 1517.
Despite the paralysis, the master continued his active creative life, resorting to the help of his student Francesco Melzi. Da Vinci's health deteriorated, and by the end of 1519 it was already difficult for him to walk without assistance. This evidence is consistent with the theoretical diagnosis. Scientists believe that a repeated attack of cerebrovascular accident in 1519 ended life path famous Italian.
Monument to Leonardo da Vinci in Milan, Italy
At the time of his death, the master was in the castle of Clos-Lucé near the city of Amboise, where he lived for the last three years of his life. In accordance with Leonardo's will, his body was buried in the gallery of the Church of Saint-Florentin.
Unfortunately, the master's grave was destroyed during the Huguenot wars. The church in which the Italian was buried was looted, after which it fell into severe neglect and was demolished by the new owner of the Amboise castle, Roger Ducos, in 1807.
Amboise Castle
After the destruction of the Saint-Florentin chapel, the remains from many burials over the years were mixed and buried in the garden.
Since the mid-nineteenth century, researchers have made several attempts to identify the bones of Leonardo da Vinci. Innovators in this matter were guided by the lifetime description of the master and selected the most suitable fragments from the found remains. They were studied for some time. The work was led by archaeologist Arsen Housse. He also found fragments of a tombstone, presumably from da Vinci's grave, and a skeleton in which some fragments were missing. These bones were reburied in the reconstructed artist's tomb in the Chapel of Saint-Hubert on the grounds of the Castle of Amboise.
Da Vinci's tomb at Amboise Castle
In 2010, a team of researchers led by Silvano Vinceti was going to exhume the remains of the Renaissance master. It was planned to identify the skeleton using genetic material taken from the burials of Leonardo's paternal relatives. Italian researchers were unable to obtain permission from the castle owners to carry out the necessary work.
On the site where the Church of Saint-Florentin used to be located, at the beginning of the last century a granite monument was erected, marking the four hundredth anniversary of the death of the famous Italian. The engineer's reconstructed grave and stone monument with his bust are among the most popular attractions in Amboise.
Self-portrait of Leonardo da Vinci
Discoveries of Leonardo da Vinci in the field of science and technology- totality scientific discoveries and technical inventions made Italian artist, scientist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)
Leonardo da Vinci proposed drawings of a number of mechanisms and inventions. He studied hydraulics, statics and dynamics of bodies, geometry, optics, anatomy, botany, paleontology, and military science.
Leonardo's influence on the subsequent development of science is a matter of debate, as it has been pointed out that his manuscripts were unknown until the publication of J. B. Ventura's work in 1797. Opponents of this point of view believe that Leonardo da Vinci's ideas were spread orally or through his manuscripts. A number of Leonardo's ideas are contained in the works of Nicolo Tartaglia (1499-1552), Hieronymus Cardan (1501-1576) and Giovan Batista Benedetti (1530-1590).
Inventions
From tens to hundreds of Leonardo's inventions are contained in the form of drawings in his notebooks and may be accompanied by remarks. Drawings are sometimes repeated, modified and improved.
Among the most famous inventions of Leonardo da Vinci, Mario Llozzi in the book “History of Physics” notes: devices for converting and transmitting motion (in particular, steel chain drives used in bicycles); simple and intertwined belt drives, various clutches (bevel, spiral, stepped); roller bearings to reduce friction, double connection (now known as cardan and used in cars); various machines: for example, an automatic notching machine, a machine for molding gold bars, a mechanical loom and spinning machine, weaving machines (shearing, twisting, carding); suspension of axles on moving wheels located around them to reduce friction during rotation - a predecessor of ball and roller bearings; a device for testing the tensile strength of metal threads; combat vehicles for waging war; new musical instruments; higher definition coin minting machine. During his lifetime, Leonardo received recognition for his invention of a wheel lock for a pistol (started with a key).
Hydraulics and hydrostatics
Leonardo da Vinci was involved in practical hydraulics, participating in a number of hydraulic engineering works of his time. He took part in the reclamation of Lomellina, the construction of hydraulic structures in Navara, designed the diversion of the Arno River at the Pisa Bridge, studied the problem of draining the Pontic works, and worked on hydraulic structures on the Adda and the Martesan Canal.
While carrying out hydraulic engineering work, Leonardo da Vinci made a number of inventions. He designed dredgers similar to modern ones, created mechanical means for digging canals, and improved locks to make canals navigable, namely, he introduced a system of shields that controlled the size of the openings for filling and emptying the lock.
In the field of theoretical hydrostatics, Leonardo knew the principle of communicating vessels for liquids of different densities, and also knew the basic principle of hydrostatics, now known as Pascal's law. According to the historian of science Duhem, Pascal learned this law from Leonardo da Vinci through Giovan Batisto Benedetti and Marino Mersenne, with whom Pascal corresponded.
Leonardo became the author of the theory of wave motion on the sea and expressed the idea that wave motion underlies a number of physical phenomena. According to the “History of Physics” by M. Llozzi, Leonardo expressed the ideas that light, sound, color, smell, magnetism are distributed in waves.
Flight
Leonardo da Vinci was interested in flight for more than two decades, from 1490 to 1513. He began by studying the flight of birds. In 1490, he designed the first model of an aircraft, to which he later returned. This model had wings like those of a bat and was supposed to be propelled by human muscular power. Currently, it is believed that the problem of building an aircraft driven by muscular force is insoluble, since it is not enough for flight.
Leonardo later thought about soaring flight using wind energy.
Leonardo also came up with the idea of a helicopter, the driving element of which should be a fast-moving spiral:
A screw apparatus, which, if rotated at high speed, is screwed into the air and rises upward.
In the Codex Atlanticus, Leonardo gives what appears to be the earliest design for a parachute.
Statics and dynamics
While studying perspective in relation to painting, Leonardo moved on to problems of geometry and mechanics.
Experimental Scientific Method and Its Applications
Being an artist, Leonardo da Vinci was interested in the theory of optics. He gave a description of the camera obscura and used it in the theory of vision. He proposed glasses for observing the Moon, established that the eyes see three-dimensional bodies differently, and worked on parabolic mirrors. The first to suggest that the ashen light of the Moon is light that is first reflected from the Earth and then from the Moon. He proposed the first design of a telescope with two lenses.
In his anatomical studies, Leonardo da Vinci, summarizing the results of autopsies, laid the foundations of modern scientific illustration, making a series of detailed drawings of various organs, muscles and systems of the human body. Leonardo described the human body as an example of “natural mechanics.” He discovered and described a number of bones and nerves, studied the problems of embryology and comparative anatomy.