Bill Gates lends his Leonardo manuscript to the Uffizi

Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, became the owner of the Leonardo manuscript when he bought it back in 1994 through Christie’s for US$30,8 million from the US petroleum magnate Armand Hammer. Today it still holds the record for the second highest sale price of any book sold and is considered one of the most famous of Da Vinci’s 30 scientific manuscripts. Last time the document was displayed in Florence in 1982 and it has attracted 400,000 of visitors at the time.

Leonardo manuscript, titled "On the Nature, Weight and Motion of Waterwill" was named the Codex Leicester later on, after its owner Thomas Coke, who was Earl of Leicester. It is made up of 18 leather-bound double-sided sheets (about 30×44 cm each) for a total of 72 pages, featuring da Vinci detailed left-hand annotations and fascinating drawings, sketches and diagrams.

The central theme of the codex is water: its nature, its movements, its strength in destroying the obstacles on its way. Leonardo not only observes it as an essential element but also makes recommendations how to transform its potential to benefit humans. He proposes innovative mechanical and plumbing devices, bridge construction and erosion.

Water was not the only interest of the inquisitive mind of the Renaissance

The Renaissance is the period that began around the 14th century and ended at the late 16th century, traditionally associated primarily with the Italian region. The ideas and images of the Renaissance largely determined the aesthetic ideals of modern man, his sense of harmony, measure and beauty. Read more

genius. Leonardo put notes of his scientific experiments and inquiries into different matters such as geology, mechanics and astronomy. Instead of a single linear script, Da Vinci arranged his codex as a mixture of observations and theories on astronomy; the properties of water, rocks, and fossils; air, and celestial light. He even covered the luminosity of the moon. An artist and an engineer, he actually described in here the phenomenon of planet-shine one hundred years before the German astronomer Johannes Kepler proved it.

The Uffizi Galleries and the Museo Galileo collaborate in preparations for the coming exhibition, The Codex Leicester. Water, Nature’s Microscope, anticipated from October 29th, 2018 to January 20th, 2019.

The manuscript will go on display in the Aula Magliabechiana inside the Uffizi Gallery and will be accompanied by the Codescope, an innovative multimedia device that will help visitors to browse the manuscript individual sheets on the digital screens, to access the transcriptions and interpretations of the texts, written in Leonardo’s characteristic back-to-front mirrored style, and to receive information on the topics covered.

Alongside the Codex Leicester and the Codescope that makes the manuscript readable and understandable for people of today, the exhibition will showcase other extraordinary drawings by Da Vinci from around the same period, on loan from Italian and international institutions, offering a comprehensive overview of the Italian Renaissance

The Renaissance is the period that began around the 14th century and ended at the late 16th century, traditionally associated primarily with the Italian region. The ideas and images of the Renaissance largely determined the aesthetic ideals of modern man, his sense of harmony, measure and beauty. Read more

, and particularly the flourishing period of creativity in Florence in the early 16th century.

The coming display provides a rare glimpse inside da Vinci’s mind and composes an exceptional illustration of the link between art and science and the creativity of the scientific process.