In Vinci, where Leonardo was born and where he drew early inspiration for his studies and paintings, the Leonardo Museum presents one of the most extensive and most original collections devoted to the multiple interests of Leonardo the technologist, the architect, the man of science and, more generally, to the History of Renaissance technics.The museum route, spread over two adjacent buildings: the Palazzina Uzielli and the Conti Guidi Castle, presents its machines and models accompanied by specific references to the artist’s sketches and handwritten notes, which are also supplemented by digital animations and interactive applications.
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Leonardo's MechanicsPalazzina Uzielli, immersive roomA true incipit ofthe museum tour, the immersive video 'Leonardo's Mechanics' introduces the main theme of the collection.The digital processing with a sequence of Leonardo's drawings presented according to the themes addressed by the museum, restores Leonardo's continuous and passionate research into motion and the causes that generate it. Every single mechanical element of Leonardo's designs seems to come to life thanks to the addition of sound elements, which translate the individual graphic elements presented into sounds.
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Building-site machineryPalazzina Uzielli, Building-site machinery sectionIn 1420 Filippo Brunelleschi began what was to be one of the major undertakings of the Italian Renaissance: building the cupola for Florence’s Cathedral.
The hoists and the cranes he designed to raise and precisely position enormous loads, up to heights of almost a hundred metres above the ground, profoundly impressed the young Leonardo and other contemporary artist-engineers such as Mariano di Iacopo, Francesco di Giorgio, Buonaccorso Ghiberti and Giuliano da San Gallo. Theirs is the merit of having passed on, through their work notebooks, a perpetual record of these devices which represented a fundamental leap forward in the technology of building site machinery.
Leonardo's time spent at the Cathedral building site in Florence is recounted in the film in the room, which briefly illustrates the historical and artistic context in which this great undertaking was born: that of 15th-century Florence, in which the most renowned artists, including Brunelleschi, worked on the realisation of grandiose works destined to celebrate the prestige of their patrons, often rich exponents of the so-called 'Arti' (Arts), the guilds that were responsible for the city's incredible economic development. -
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Textile manufacturing technologyPalazzina Uzielli, Textile manufacturing technology section
Leonardo dedicated much time and effort to the study of the multi-stage and complex production cycle of textile manufacturing, inventing machines for twisting and doubling thread, for spinning and for weaving. Some of his designs are timely suggestions for improvements directed at the partial or complete automation of the main phases of the manufacturing cycle, whereas others are daring forays towards factory and mass-production systems.
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Mechanical clocksPalazzina Uzielli, Mechanical clocks section
Fascinated by all the mechanical elements inside clocks which ensure the transmission of motion, Leonardo showed a particular interest in devices for the measurement of time. He performed what were almost anatomical dissections on them in a continual quest for solutions which could achieve ever-more sophisticated levels of automation.
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Leonardo and the AnatomyPalazzina Uzielli, section Leonardo and the anatomyLeonardo explored in depth the human body, the machine from which he was fascinated and considered far more perfect than those created by man. He wanted to understand the functioning, composition and death-related dynamics. The master approaches anatomy studies to better represent the human body; but the curiosity and the soul of Leonardo's scientist will soon lead him to deepen his studies and his researches from the surface (muscles, nerves, bones) to the study of internal organs.
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Anatomy of machinesPalazzina Uzielli, Anatomy of machines sectionLeonardo’s survey of the elements of machines reveals his extraordinary mechanical and engineering expertise. He turned his attention to mechanisms and gears such as the endless screw, the toothed wheel, the pinion, the pulley, andsprings that, assembled in various ways, can give rise to nearly infiniteseries of more or less complex machines.The system of decomposition of machines into individual mechanisms in order to better analyze them, thus allowing the conceptualization of new projects, is sometimes defined using the expression “anatomy of machines”, owing to the close analogy with the method he adopted for study of the human body. Such was the man from Vinci’s interest in machineelements that he had the intention of dedicating a proper treatise to them, as emerged from Codex Madrid I, in order to deal analytically with their characteristics, their different possibilities of use, and their potentialbenefits.
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WagonsCastle of the Guidi Counts, Anatomy of machines sectionGrande fu la capacità di Leonardo nel proporre soluzioni innovativeanche nell’ideazione di oggetti di uso comune come i carri che alla sua epocaerano il mezzo più diffuso per trasportare le merci e le persone.
Egli migliorò il loro funzionamento e ne prolungò la vitaoperativa inserendo negli assi delle ruote dei dispositivi antifrizione similiai moderni cuscinetti. Questi, dalla caratteristica forma a rullo o a disco,riducevano inoltre lo sforzo di trazione e ne facilitavano il traino. Leonardoprogettò anche sistemi per rendere autonomo il movimento dei carri utilizzandoingranaggi a lanterna e ruote a dentatura laterale azionati da una manovella.
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Machines for trasforming the landCastle of the Guidi Counts, Machines for trasforming the land section
The wish to shape the land has always been a distinguishing feature of human history: erecting river banks, building canals and altering the profiles of hills are just some of the interventions made by engineersin every age, albeit with varying degrees of know ledge and different technological resources, to manage water courses, facilitate trade or enable the expansion of towns and cities. In this field of study, Leonardo and other Renaissance engineers looked first of all to machines from the Roman tradition, still widely used on building sites of the age.
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War machineryConti Guidi Castle, War machines sectionIn 1482, Leonardo left Florence for Milan. It was at the court of Ludovico il Moro that he displayed his lively interest in the techniques and the tools for waging war, concentrating on searching for solutions which could increase the precision of shots and the firepower, as well as the speed of loading firearms.
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The bridgesConti Guide Castle, The bridges sectionConsidering the crucial importance of watercourses, which are ways of communication in time of peace, but obstacles to be overcome in time of war, Leonardo devoted himself assiduously to designing proposals toward regulating them or overcoming them.His bridges can be subdivided into three categories, based on their possible function: those for military use, such as the rapid-construction bridges, those designed for a utopian Ideal City, such as the bridge with overlapping carriageways and the rotating bridge; and finally, those built on commission, including the canal bridge with basins, requested by the City of Florence, toward planning the diverting of the River Arno during the war with Pisa.
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Mechanisms and toolsConti Guide Castle, Mechanisms and tools sectionLeonardo devoted a large proportion of his reflections to mechanics and the study of the component parts of machines, analysing the principles and criteria by which they worked.
In his drawings, the individual elements of machines, such as screws, toothed or spur wheels, lantern gears, pulleys and springs, are combined with one another to give life to mechanisms and tools which can perform more or less complex operations.
The study of movement and transmission of movement, leads Leonardo to conceive pulley systems for raising large loads, mechanisms for transforming motion and eliminate or reduce friction. -
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Studies on flightConti Guide Castle, Studies on the flight sectionLeonardo, during his first stay in Milan,began dedicating his attention to planning flying machines with flapping wings which would imitate the structure and the propulsive movement of a bird’s wing. Leonardo devoted himself to the observation of birds, studying their flight techniques and their body structure. But, as man was incapable of producing sufficient energy to move the wings, it would not be possible for him to effect flapping wing or mechanical flight. And so he diverted his attention towards gliding or soaring flight, in which propulsion is totally entrusted to aerial currents. And so he devised the delta-winged craft, and the flying sphere.
Leonardo also designed some scientific instruments such as the hygrometer and the anemometer, whereas for aerial navigation he used an inclinometer. Leonardo’s studies of flight led him to investigate the analogies between the behaviour of air and water, in other words. -
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Leonardo in VinciConti Guide Castle, Leonardo in Vinci sectionWater, a fundamental element in Leonardo’s geological concept as a tool of Nature’s activity, was often a central object of his studies from the earliest years of his stay in Lombardy. The scientist in him applied his knowledge of mechanics to the realization of works aimed at diverting, rectifying and regimenting water courses, as well as exploiting their hydraulic energy for milling or cottage industry. To this end he produced numerous cartographic surveys which, for the ways in which features are represented, are quite unique in the cultural environment of his time.
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Ebbe nome LionardoCastello dei Conti Guidi, sala immersivaThe first biographical events about Leonardo, from his birth in Vinci to his education in the Florence of Renaissance, and the lasting bond of the artist with his homeland are narrated in an innovative immersive room. Here, starting from the suggestions that come from the archive’s documents, through an installation that masterfully combines sounds, images and words, the events that prove the presence of Leonardo in Vinci are recalled.
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Hall of the PodestàCastle of the Guidi Counts, Hall of the PodestàHaving passed under Florentine dominion between 1254 and 1273, beginning in 1372 the Castle of Vinci became the residence of the podestas, officials sent by Florence to administer justice out in the countryside.
Even today we can admire their aristocratic coats of arms, painted on the walls of this room. On the eastern side, we find the large Renaissance fireplace in pietra serena commissioned by the podesta Neri Ventura in 1478, while the Madonna with Child and Young St. John, produced in glazed terracotta in 1523 by Giovanni della Robbia, stands out on the northern wall. On the western wall is a small opening testifying to the historical passage allowing access, up until the 13th century, to the tower by means of a ladder. -
Geometric solidsConti Guidi Castle, Geometric solids sectionROOM TEMPORARILY CLOSEDDespite the fact that he had not received a thorough grounding in the principles of mathematics and geometry, it soon became clear to Leonardo that every rule on which we can gain insight through experimental observation needs a mathematical formula to accompany it.
He considered the study of geometry the theoretical structure behind scientific research and an indispensable tool for his activities as a painter and an architect.
The arrival in Milan of the mathematician Luca Pacioli in 1496 marked a major turning-point in Leonardo’s knowledge of mathematics, and he immediately began studying under him. At that time, Pacioli was working on the book De divina proportione, which was to be published in Venice in 1509. Leonardo drew a large number of illustrations of geometric solids for it, both the full versions, seen in perspective, and in the so-called ‘empty’ versions, in which only the linear structure is shown: from the simplest solids, such as the sphere, to very complex polyhedra. -