Leonardo Online
The European Union is funding a project that is putting the papers and sketches of Leonardo Da Vinci online. Over 3,000 pages have already been digitized and are available for viewing.
Until now the majority of the manuscripts have been seen only by scholars but the National Museum of Leonardo in his hometown of Vinci has promised to scan about 12,000 pages and create an archive.
The European Union is funding the website leonardodigitale.com, and 3,000 pages have been scanned so far.
The drawings, from the late 15th and early 16th century, demonstrate the artist's incredible range, touching on geometry, astronomy, botany, zoology, the art of warfare and the flight of birds.
All of the writing is in mirror-image. Leonardo chose to write in reverse because it prevented smudging. However, large sections are difficult to decipher because much of the writing is jumbled together, with shopping lists next to technical instructions.
"We are still at the beginning, and we hope to get hold of some of the other manuscripts, too," said Romano Nanni, the director of the Leonardo Library.
The artist's works are spread around Europe in 10 separate manuscripts. Although most of it was brought back to Italy after his death in 1519, the archives were subsequently broken up and eventually ended up largely in the hands of Napoleon.
The website is only available in Italian at the moment, but a version in English is due in about two months.
By Jack, Monday, 9 July , 2007 @ 8:17 pm
I registered at this website.
The registration was a bit tricky (I guess they already have quite a few users with my common user name) and was in Italian but was no real problem.
The archives are very useful for my studies.
I appreciate you posting this.
Thanks,
Jack.