EMANUEL WINTERNITZ
Reprinted from PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, Vol. 111, No. 4, August, 1967
PROCEEDINGS
of the
Tn 1s PAPER is intcndC'd to focus on some peculiar own memory; sometimes-not always-with \'erbal
research habits of Leonardo <la Vinci and to reveal comments, from sharp condensed formulations to
an interplay between some of his interests that cryptic notes. Today I should like to concentrate
today would hardly he considered to be inter- on one single field among Leonardo's interests,
related at all. \Ve will deal, as one of many other anatomy, as the inspiring force and inAuence upon
possible examples of this fori11a 111cntis, with the his invent ion of machines and musical instruments.
relationship l1etween his study of anatomy. that is In the human and animal hody God created won-
of machine;. created hy God or ?\a tu re. and, on the derfully subtle machines; from their study we may
other hand. the imention of machines created by profit in the construction of similar and perhaps
himself. e,·en better machines. Com·ersely. after haYing
\Ve all know the cliche of Leonardo the Uni- constructed new machines, "·e may recognize some
Yersal ge:1i11s. Ile was by no means the only one. of their functional elements in the mechanics or in
There were other men of astonishing yersatility, the physiology of the human body, and so sharpen
such as Leon Battista Alberti; and other thinkers our understanding of the mechanisms of the human
and doers, artists and inYentors of tools. not to hody. These are not Leonardo's words. they are
mention the printer, diplomat, philosopher, and in- only my reconstruction of an inherent tendency of
Yentor of machines and musical instruments who Leonardo's mind, which becomes apparent if we
gave his name and its tradition to this house whose examine for hidden interrelations many of his
hospitality we enjoy today. seemingly unconnected notes and sketches found
If there was something unique in Leonardo's sometimes in close proximity on the same page, or,
uni,·ersality, it was the profound and systematic as in many cases, on pages w idely apart in the
combination of many of his "fields," the interplay notebooks as they haYe come down to us.
between art and science. between the many aYenues
of research. between empirical research and mathe- :\fay I now set the stage. as it were, hy calling
matical analysis, between observation and creation. attention to Leonardo's obsession with analogies or
To study this interplay is not easy. First. one has parallels. If he sketches the hones of a human
to pierce the glass walls existing today-in our foot. he will draw right beside it the foot of a hear
over-specialized and computerized world-between or a dog or a monkey. in order to compare their
the departmental pigeonholes. As the wise old mechanical actions. If he draws human profiles
monk. the Staretz Sosima. tells his young pupil expressing calm or frenzy or aggression, he will
.\ljoscha in the Brothers Kara111aso1;: "They have flank them with scribbles showing comparable ani-
divided the ,,·oriel into hundreds of parts. and now mal faces, of horses or lions. etc. \\' hen he studies
they have forgotten how the parts hang together." the behm·ior of water cascading or rebounding or
A secol'd difficulty is created by the form in wh ich flowing against an obstacle, he will ask immediately
Leonardo's thought has come to us: o'·er 2.000 how other media, such as light. sound. magnetic
pages distributed a111ong the Ambrosiana in ~l ilan. force. or e,·cn odor spread and rebound. etc. There
\Vindsor Castle. the I nstitut de Prance. the British exists one priceless page (Cod .• 111. 126ra) (fig-.
~Iuseum. and many other places: and also the na- 1)-I mean most re\·ealing for our problem-that
ture of Leonardo's notes: many sketches. often ap- compares in a condensed synoptic fashion four
parent!) u11con11ccted with each other, ranging media. from top to bottom. On the right margin
iro111 accurate cletailecl plans and engineering de- nine small schematic drawings illustrate how light,
signs to hasty and oftC'n enigmatic records for his the force of a blow. sound. magnetic forces and
, 0 Copyri11:ht as part of
PROCEEDIXGS OF TIIE A\IERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, \"OL. 1 JI, NO. 4, At:Gl:ST, 1%7
Reprint Printed in U.S.A.
235 E\IA~CEL \\'l:\TERXITZ !PROC .•\\IER . 1'1111 .. SOC
.
i
"\.
"l
,Q ............. ,. ',-~"l... .!'""~~·"1·1 .,......... :,[l.. ;~I 1t seems that what I h;I\ c called an obsession
with analogies is onl: the surface o f a basic bent
,·~
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)/'l~wtll•l ••1~ ·.t~·~,···~
".'."'l~~-··'
fl'
.....
1·.·· '
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~·~~"ftff, ~
FIG. 3. Sketch of the brachia! plexus and diagrams of
the base of the skull, the spinal cord and a cervical
vertebra, from Fogli dc/l'A11atomia B 4 v.
. r
} I
~ .... ·~·-tH
~)(~-1::!:;::
ing for was the blueprint for creation-creation in
both senses of the word: the organizing fo:-ces as
well as their result, a homogeneous comprehensible
Universe.
Leonardo's notes on anatomy and his numerous
anatomical drawings are full of references to the
laws of mechanics that help to illuminate structure
and function of the body. The God-made and the
:\[an-made machine are both ruled by the same set
of laws. the laws of mechanics. This belief of
Leonardo is most clearly revealed in several draw-
ings which, even to the uninitiated eye, represent
a strange border realm between anatomy observed
and mechanics: they are not fantasies or playful
creations of the pen, but serve an eminently sci-
entific purpose.
A page, for example. from the Quaderni
d' Anato111ia II 5 v (fig. 2) at \ Vindsor Castle
shows a diagram of tendons and muscles attached
to the spine. Leonardo does not draw the muscles
in their full width, but represents them by thin F rG. 4. Diagrams of the spinal cord and brachia! plexus,
cords to show clearly and transparently their func- from Fogli dell'A11atomia B 23 r.
237 E\l.\:\l'EL \\' l .\'TER:\ ITZ l l'KOC. \\ll·K. 1'1111 .. SOC.
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FIG. 6. Sketches for a derrick, from Cadice At /011/ico, fol. 16-t r -a; detail.
239 E\IA:\CEL \\'1:-\TER~ITZ (PROC. \\11,R. 1'1111. SOC.
documented by a drawing in MS A of the Institut tendineae (above) leading to the heart vah es. To
de France, fol. 28 v, (fig. 8) which has marginal the right of this drawing is a larger detail of these
sketches of figures descending, ascending, running,
arising from a sitting posture, etc: or in the folio
from the Quaderni d'Anatomia at \Vindsor Castle
VI 18 r (fig. 9) which also analyzes the ascending
and descending body.
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surrounded hy the flames of Hell, and flanked by
two niches. ::\1'otice the massiYe vaulting.
At this point I must Yoice some reservations.
·'T~·~, in·~ ·~ ..f .. "-t.• "·· 1 There existed, of course, Renaissance churches
., ....t...-.1.., ,,.. ,..,..... t.
,.. .f !f:... i • ..~··· ·l'r1' with three aisles and a dome, fo r example, the
•1 \"' :,..lr·"I .• ,., "to "'
.., ......') .,_..:i ;·-·"!ti,,. Cathedral of Florence whose dome was designed
_ .., ....,.,. ~·'1"! 04,. ...
....1•)..;, .,,,. ••~· ~:,,, '"t:/ long before Leona rdo's time by Arnolfo di Cambio
-'f ~IHI W :f'41;~
•-i .,.,,... 1li•., Alt/". ..., and Brunelleschi. Symmetrical stage designs also
~ A-'hcftr- ,,..),.Pt existed before Leonardo, though the mountain
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-.,~;~...~~'t"-a:\.Ot
...~7-,f·,.,~:,e
u ,.._ ....) '11}'f
opening in full sight of the spectators was probably
an original idea of his. S till, the resemblance of
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Y.. _ these structures to the configuration existing inside
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~··"" l,.p(.f ,,..,.t>'l\• .....,.,.,. ..1h A.Ji\>"1 J. .W{H)
- .,/,,.,.'( ..'l\·A ,..,.\>(,,.(-••,, C., J "'1 ,..,,.t> ••• ,.... '
.•,, .,...,,.."ft• '"f '"'··l· ~ i ~,...1 ..~ "'""'rf ··"r"~.
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fir: _. t ~ ..,.,.....,. ..t·.f ·1·\-:-:' .,.. . . y,.t ......~ ,...,, ,("" ·,/
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FIG. 11. Codice Allanlico, fol. 37 r-a, including sections through a polygonal church.
hand up and down just as with the coiled trumpet the upper octaves; and "moYing the hand up and
and more so in the pipe a; and you can obtain one down" evidently means not to stop prearranged
eighth or sixteenth of the tone and just as much as finger holes, but to move along the sl its to change
1 you want. ) Obtaining an eighth and one sixteenth
obviously means- in acoustical language-to reach
pitch gradually, or as we say today, to produce
glissandos (or gliding tones).
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Such a glissando instrument would not have
fitted into the orchestra of Leonardo's days.
Could he have foreseen in one dreamy corner of
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Fie. 16. Quaderni d'A11alomia V 16 r; detail showing
section of the neck with larynx, probably from an
animal.
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FIG. 17. .l!S Arrmdel (263 British ).fu seum) 175 r, wfth sketches of mu,,ical in,;trumenb.
245 E\L\~ l .EL \U~TER'.\ITZ [PROC. \ \IFR. PlllL. SOC.
••"
,.p.. u..j f·~·., ~
"!.
.. ' \ <
,.~~ ·u•" •·f•t_ • r
., ,.. ...., ...... ,. ;.,.. '....
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from a central point to the point where motion is
tl\., ~
t~···...::··.....-u7t~-~~:!'
··~- .. '.
... ; ••,. - "l4" ,. needed, the finger tips. A similar situation exists
- ~.::~~~':,i~ ~1,, (
t't ~ M~ JI. H{ ~I ~""' ~~
I
r ·........ I t·•·' ····· 1" ......... .. in the fingers; see, for example, Fogli d' Anatomia
......
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:;.. ,.::; ............,.... t" ,
H1 \l. J• ....
1-;·;"~¥---- -~t,
•.
r'•ll'..~ A 10 v (fig. 19). There remains only to say that
Leonardo's idea stayed buried in his notebooks:
-~1
> ,
\° 1·r,;
.I ...... 4 .
•
I\ 1'
·~~···-o/C•"'':.-:1 we do not even know whether he himself ever built
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"rt•·:?·.... .-
joJ·H'·»· ........
· /j,,_ ·-~~· L#..• r,,.,.t -~
an actual instrument embodying his invention.
Still, the significance and novelty of his invention
,_
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is indisputable. Four-hundred and fifty years
~j ~lt..~~i
\~. .
·~~:,:ra ~t•"""t'\"4Y"'""
··~.:.: : ..........
~,~_.. later, the wind instrument with a complete key-
Il l
.•' ' • ... , •l• l
or more modestly, the creative process. we can at Dell' A11ato111ia Fogli B, Royal Library \;vincl sor ; pub-
best lift but one little corner. lished by T. Sabachnikoff and G. Pium?.ti, Turin, 1901.
Quademi d'Aiuztomia, Library di Windsor'; published by
UST OF NOTEBOOKS QUOTED Ove C. L. Vangensten, A. F onahn, H . Hopstock,
Chri stiania, 1911 to 1916.
I:\ T HI S ST UDY
.Ifa11uscript Anmdel 263, British 1Iuscum; published by
Codice A tla11tico, Ambrosian Library, 1Iilan; facsimile the Reale Commissione Vinciana; Danesi, Rome, 1923
edition D irico H oepli, 1lilan, 1894 to 1903. to 1930.
Dell' A natomia Fogli A, Royal Library Windsor; pub- Jfaiwscript A, Institute de France, Paris; published by
lished by T. Sabachnikoff and G. Piumati, Paris, 1898. Ravaisson-1Iollien, Paris, 1881.