1 of 14

Write now Article Tools

"Leonardo da Vinci, Scientist and Engineer"

(To Leonardo da Vinci, art' meant skill, science' meant know-ledge, and as such, they were not independent fields of human creativity. On the contrary, the combination of the two represented the essence of what came to be known as the RENAISSANCE MAN' -a man who sought to develop skills and acquire knowledge of human endeavor.)

Today, almost five hundred years after his death, the genius of Leonardo da Vinci continues to astonish. In his time his contemporaries as a painter and sculptor, as well as a goldsmith regarded him. He was sought and functioned as a military engineer, an inventor of war machines; and in peacetime roles served as a competent architect and bridge builder. He even volunteered his services to the Venetians when they were threatened by the invading Turks; later he was employed by Cesare Borgia, the Duke of Romanga, in his military campaigns to conquer parts of Umbria and the Marshes, and he worked for the Florentine Signoria on an elaborate canalization project. (In order to defend Florence against Pisa, Leonardo proposed a strategic plan to cut the city of Pisa off from the sea by diverting the Arno River through a complex canal system. Although the canal was never built, centuries later a highway from Florence to the sea was built on the same route that Leonardo had chosen.)

The achievements of this intellectual giant were perceived after the publications of his manuscripts and notebooks in the 19th century. Leonardo's gifts were manifested. In addition to art, Leonardo excelled in the fields of music, writing, science, and technology. Leonardo is the quintessential Renaissance man, a universal giant, equally brilliant in the arts as well as in the fields of science; his inventiveness and creativity seem to have no bounds.

How could one person have carried out such extraordinary varied feats of the mind? The explanation provided by Giorgio Vasari, his first biographer was simple. Leonardo's prodigious intellectual production resulted from his "genius" which was a "gift of God". Far from being "acquired" through "human art," it was "marvelous and divine" in origin, it came from "the heavens" which had "rained down the richest gifts - with lavish abundance" upon Leonardo. "The grace of God so possessed his mind," Vasari wrote, and "nature favored him greatly," that "in whatever his brain or mind took up, he displayed unrivalled divinity, vigor, vivacity, excellence, beauty, and grace."

By the 19th

• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5
• next page >>

Add your voice

Know something about Biography: Leonardo da Vinci?
We want to hear your view. Write now!