Leonardo da Vinci as a musician

Leonardo da Ainci as a ,f,lusician

Leonnrdo dn Oincifr;fr

^/tusicinn€manwel Winternitz

YALE UNIVERSITY PRESSNEW HAVEN AND LONDON

Published with assistance from the foundation estab-lished in memory of Philip Hamilton McMillan of theClass of 1894, Yale College.

Copyright @ t99zby Yale University.All rights reserved.

This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, inany form (beyond that copying permitted bv Sections ro7and ro8 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except bv re-viewers for the public press), without written permissionfrom the publishers.

"The Viola Organista" (chap. 8), "Melodic and ChordalDrumsi Other Membranophones; Tunable Bells" (chap.

9), and "Wind Instruments: The Glissando Flute, KevMechanisms for Wind Instruments, New Bellow,s" (chap.

rr) are adapted, respectively, from "Leonardo's Inventionof the Viola Organista," "Melodic, Chordal, and OtherDrums Invented by Leonardo da Vinci," and "Leonardo,s

Invention of Key Mechanisms for Wind Instruments,"which were published as number zo of Estratto da Raccolta

Vinciana (Milan, 1964). "The Role of Music in Leonardo,sParagone" (chap. tz) is adapted from an article of the same

title published as a contribution to a Festschrift for AlfredSchutz in Phenomenology and Social R?a/iry, edited byMaurice Natanson (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, r97).

Designed by James J. Johnson and set in Palatino Romanby the Composing Room of Michigan. Printed in theUnited States of America b1' The Murrav Printing Co.,Westford, Mass.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Prhlication Data

Winternitz, Emanuel.

Leonardo da Vinci as a musician.

Includes index.

r. Leonardo, da Vinci, :.452-1.5ag. z. Music-Italy-History and criticism-Medieval, 4oo-15oo.

3. Musical instruments. I. Title.ML4z9.L46tN5 78o'.92'4 8r-16475

ISBN o-3oo-oz63r-5 AACRz

ro98765432r

IN GRATITUDE TO MISS MARY McCLANE

Her sense of style and her gift for organizing ideas,

her unfailing memory, her learned loae of early music,and her strict pruning of my effusiae Viennese English

contributed no end to the completion of this book.

Die ungeheuren Umrisse von Leonardos Wesen wird man ewig nur von ferneahnen k6nnen.

The colossal contours of Leonardo's being will always be divined only from afar.

-Jaxon Buncrnanor, Die Kultur der

Renaissance in ltalim

Contents

List of Illustrations xi

Preface and Acknowledgments xviiList of Leonardo's Manuscripts Referred to in this Book, with Abbreviations xix

Introduction xxiPart I. ROOTS AND GROWTH

Musical environment, traditions and trends,musical friends, exchange of ideasr Musical life in Florence and Milan 3z Gaffuius and Pacioli 53 Gusnasco and Migliorotti 77

Part II. THE PERFORMERImproviser, teacher of music, organizer ofstage plays and entertainments4 The Lira da Braccio 25

5 The Mystery of the Skull Lyre 396 Feste, Theater and Other Entertainments 73

Part III. THE THINKERScientist, experimenter and pioneer in acoustics,inventor of new and fantastic instruments7 Research on Acoustics 978 New String Instruments and the Viola Organista a37

9 Melodic and Chordal Drums, Other Membranophones, andTunable Bells :.68

10 Toys and Folk Instruments a87

at Wind Instruments: The Glissando Flute, Key Mechanisms forWind Instruments, and New Bellows 792

az The Paragone: The Role of Music in the Comparisonof the Arts 2o4

Conclusion 224

Appendix. Italian Texts 229

Index of Codex References 43General Index 45

lx

List of lllwstrations

z.r. Portrait of a musician, probably byLeonardo da Vinci. Ambrosiana, Milan.

z.z. Woodcut showing Gaffurius teaching,used as an illustration inhis Angelicum

Opus Musice (Milan, r5o8) and other ofhis publications.

2.3. Portraitof Gaffurius. MuseoCivico, Lodi.2.4. Miniature portrait of a teacher, possibly

Gaffurius. Codice Laudense XXVII. A. 9.2.5. Detail of the portrait. Codice Laudense

XXVII.A.92.6. Drawing of an "icosahedron solidus" by

Leonardo for Pacioli's Dioina Proportione.2.7. Drawing of an "icosahedron oacuus" by

Leonardo for Pacioli's Dioina Proportione.2.8. Sketches by Leonardo of a leg represent-

ing the muscles by wires. Quadernid'Anatomia V 4 r.

2.9. Leonardo's drawing of two regularbodies, made for Pacioli. CA 253 r.

3.r. Spinettina made for the Duchess ofUrbino, r54o. Venice. MetropolitanMuseum of Art, 53.6. Pulitzer BequestFund, 1953.

3.2. Sound-hole rose of spinettina in illus. 3.r.3.3. Intarsia decoration in double symmetry;

detail of spinettina (illus. 3.r).3.4. Detail of spinettina (illus. l.r) showing

several styles of decoration: sculpture,various forms of intarsia, and certosinawork with stars in gothic tracery.

4.t Lira da braccio by Giovanni d'Andrea,Venice, r5n.

4.2. Orpheus in Hades, after a bronze plaqueby Modemo.

4.3. Lira da braccio in wood intarsia. Choirstall in Santa Maria in Organo, Venice.

4.4. Giovanni Bellini, detail from altarpiece.San Zaccaria, Venice.

4.5. Benedetto Montagna, Orpheus. Engrav-ing, Metropolitan Museum of Art,collection of photographs.

4.6. Vittore Carpaccio, Presentation in theTemple, detail. Accademia, Venice.

4.7. Intarsia of lute and lira da braccio.Studiolo, Palazzo ducale, Urbino.

4.8. Palma Vecchio, Saua conaersazione. SanZaccaia, Venice.

4.9. Allegorical figure of Musiuin the funeralmonument for Sixtus IV, by Pollaiuolo,including a lira da braccio at lower left.

4.ro. Contest between Apollo and Pan.Woodcut from Ooidio metamorphoseosaolgare, ryo1 fol. l43 r.

4.u. King David with a large lira da braccio(lirone),497.

4.12. Laureate poet with lira da braccio andbow. From Epithome Plutarchi, r5ol..

4.13. Humanist with lira da braccio.

4.r4. Lute player, with lira da braccio inbackground. Title page of Lorenzo de'Medici, Sekte d'amore.

4.t5. Lira da braccio player improvising.5.r. Bizarre musical instrument. Drawing by

Leonardo. Bibliothdque Nationale, Paris,MS zo17 Bib. Nat. C r.

5.2. Horses in Leonardo's Adoration of the

Magi. U ffizi, Florence.

5.3. Horse heads in front view and profile.Windsor rzz85.

5.4. Horse head in front and profile views,with proportion numbers. Windsor c286.

5.5. Horse head in front and profile views.Institut de France, A 6zv.

xl

xll

5.6. Detail from Verrocchio's Colleonimonument, Venice.

5.7. Page fuom The Book of Hours of Jeanned'Eoreux illustrated by Jean pucelle.Metropolitan Museum of Art, NewYork.

5.8. Cupola fresco in the Santuario ofSaronno, by Gaudenzio Ferrari.

5.9. Angel bowing and blowing; detailof illus. 5.8.

5.ro. Angel blowing a double bagpipe;detail of illus. 5.8.

5.11-

5.a2.5.a3.

The Liberation of Andromeda by Pierodi Cosimo. Uffizi, Florence.Detail of illus. 5.rr.Gaudenzio Ferrari, altarpiece.Pinacoteca, Turin.

5.14. Detail from a cassone by Bar-tolommeo di Giovanni. Louvre,Paris.

5.15. Detail from FilippinoLippi's Alle-gory of Music. Kaiser FriedrichMuseum, Berlin.

5.16. Detail of illus. 5.r5.5.r7. Leonardo, sketch of the two halves

of a skull. Windsor AN. B r9o58 v(B4rv).

5.r8. Preparation for the Entombment ot'Christ, Carpaccio. Dahlem Museum,Berlin.

5.19. Detail of illus. 5.18.5.2o. Detail of illus. 5.18, including a horse

skull.5.2r. Juxtaposition of human and animal

skulls. Engraving by Battista Franco.

5.22. St. George with a scudo, Donatello.Museo Nazionale, Florence.

5.23. Four shields in different form, in TheResutection by Donatello, right pulpitin San Lorenzo, Florence.

5.24. Donatello, Marzocco, with heraldicshield. Museo Nazionale, Florence.

5.25. Emblematic shields attached to theTree of Life, Giorgione. Louvre, Paris.

5.26. Animal skull used as shield inthe Battleof the Sea Gods, School of Mantegna.

5.27. Mantegna, page with shield, in theTrial of St. James fresco in the EremitaniChapel, Padua.

5.28. Putto with shield, Mantegna St. Andrea,Mantua.

5.29. Ornamental teschi di caaallo suspendedfrom a portal, in an architectural drawingby Leonardo. CA z79va.

5.3o. Skull of Arabian stallion in dorsal view.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

American Museum of Natural History,New York.

5.3r. Ambrogio de Predis, angel playing alira da braccio; to the right of Leonardo,sVirgin of the Rocks. National Gallery,London.

5.32. Detail of illus. 5.3r.5.33. Lorenzo Costa, Musician playing Lira

da Braccio. Louvre, Paris.5.34. Detail of illus. 5.33.5.35. Francia, two angels, the left one playing

fiddle, from 5i. Lau,rence and St. lerome.Hermitage.

5.36. Giulio and Domenico Campagnola,group of musicians in a pastoral setting(H 499.rr Hind).

537. Detail of illus. 5.36.5.r. Drawings and text bv Leonardo for the

performance of Danae including a nichefor Pluto. Metropolitan Museum of Art,New York.

6.2. Drawings and text bv Leonardo forthe stage machinery for Danae. Arundel263 (BM) 4rv.

5.3. Leonardo: drawing with sketches forstage construction and a mountainopening and closing. Arundel 263 @M)224r.

6.4. Leonardo: cross section through apolygonal church. CA 37 ra.

6.5. Leonardo: cross section of a humanheart showing"vau|t," "nave," and"aisles." Quaderni d'Anatomia II ro r.Woodcut depicting Orpheus teachingthe beasts by playing the lira da braccio.From an edition of Poliziano's Coseoulgare, Bologna, 1494.

5.5.

6.7. Drawing by Leonardo: prisoner withshackled feet and wrists. Windsor12573 t.

6.8. Drawing by Leonardo: youth onhorseback. Windsor r2574.

6.9. Drawing by Leonardo: rider on horse-back camouflaged as a bagpipe.Windsor r2585.

5.ro. Bagpipe player backward on horseback.Woodcut by Barthel Beham. ]. Muller,Kritischer Katalog 1958, no. rzo.

6.n.

6-rz

Drawing by Leonardo: youth with lancein fancy costume. Windsor 12575.Drawing by Leonardo: youth holding apalm. Windsot t2575.

5.r3. Drawing by Leonardo: female figurewith cloak. Windsor n577.

6.r4. Drawing by Leonardo: allegorical figurepointing. Windsor rz58r.


6.15. Drawing by Leonardo: costumed youthwith a three-tiered hat. Madrid MS IIfolio 76 r.

6.16. Rebus by Leonardo. Windsor rz69zv.6.17, 5.r8, and 6.19. Musical instruments

(viola, bells, "monacordo") used inrebuses by Leonardo. From AugustoMarinoni, I Rebus di Leonardo da Vinci,nos. ro5, ro7, and rz3. Windsor rz59zv.

6.2o. Rebus by Leonardo. Marinoni, no. 94.Windsor rz69zv.

6.2r. Rebus combining musical score withwords. Marinoni, no. 88. Windsorrz69zv.

7.r. Set of 9 schematic drawings illustratingthe behavior of light, the force of a blow,sound, and magnetism. Detail from CArz5 ra.

7.2. Concentric circles in water. Detail fromA6rr.

7.3. Tabulation of various blows uponmaterials of different hardness orsoftness. A 8 r.

7.4. Sketch of a bell hit bv a hammer ac-

companying the text. Detail from C 6 v.

7.5. Klangfiguren from Chladni.

7.6. Diagram of a conhaption for testing theexpansion of fragments of circular waterwaves as a model for the behavior ofsound waves. Quademi d'Anatomia IIIT2V.

7.7. "Y oung's diagram."7.8. Three diagrams accompanying the

discussion of the spread of sound.Detail, CA r99 vb.

7.9. "TheYoiceof theEcho ."Detai,CA 77 vb.

7.ro. Creatingachainof echoes. Detail, B 9ov.7.u. Rebounding sound deceiving the ear as

to its origin. C z4r.7.t2. E ar of the listener deceived by a re-

bounded sound. Detail, C 5 v'7.13. Reflection of an object by a mirror

comparable to the rebounding of soundby a wall. Detail, A 19 v.

7.t4. Explanation of the rebounding of a balland of the human voice from a wall atcertain angles. Detail, A 19 r.

7.r5. Diagram of the impact of the sound of abell toward a wall and reflected fromthere to the ear. C 16 r.

7.r5. Drum used as acoustical detective.Detail, MS zo17 Bib. Nat. r r.

7.q. Short mortar. CA 9 ra.

7.r8. Diminution of sound in proportion toits distance from its origin. L79v.

7.r9. Seven triangles symbolizing the fading

xiii

of sound at their apex, the ear, comparedwith 7 flowers, probably symbolic of thefading of odor. L 8o r.

7.2o. Star of Bethlehem and other plants.Drawing, Windsor rz4z4.

7.2r. Proportions between units of time andspace. I rz9 v.

7.22. Cross section of an onion and diagramsof the human head showingthe sensus

communis. Quaderni d'Anatomia V 5 v.

7.4. ln the center, cross section of the brainshowing the vesicles. Detail, Quadernid'Anatomia V r5 r.

7.24. ln the center, cross section of the brainshowing vesicles. Detail, Quadernid'Anatomia V zo v.

7.25. Diagram of the brain and the locationof the senses from G. Reisch's MargaritaP hilo sophiae (Strasbourg, 15 o4).

8.r. French hurdy-gurdy in lute shape,eighteenth century. MetropolitanMuseum of Art, The Crosby BrownCollection.

8.2. Wheel and stopping mechanism of aFrench eighteenth-century hurdy- gurdyin guitar shape. Metropolitan Museumof Art, The Crosby Brown Collection.

8.3. Organistrum played by two elders endof twelfth century. Portico de la Gloriaof the Cathedral of Santiago deCompostela.

8.4. Sketches for different versions of theviola organista. CA zr8 rc.

8.5. Detail of illus. 8.4.8.5. Detail of illus. 8.4.8.7. Angel playing a hurdy-gurdy. Sforza

Book of Hours, plate XXIX.8.8. Angel playing a hurdy-gurdy. From

the cupola fresco by Gaudenzio Ferrariin the Santuario at Saronno.

8.9. Geigenklavizimbel. Woodcut fromMichael Praetorius's Syntagma MusicumIl, " De Organographia," Nuremberg,1618-

8.ro. Keyboard instrument with wheels,built by Truchado, 1625. BrusselsConservatoire.

8.u. Oblique view of the soundboard withwheels from illus. 8.ro (photographedby the author).

8.12. Detail of illus. 8.4.8.r3. Clavichord; detail of the intarsias in

the Studiolo of Federigo da Montefeltroin his palace in Urbino.

8.r4. MS H z8 v. Three drawings for a violaorganista.

xlv

8.r5. MS H z8 r. Drawings for the machineryof a viola organista.

8.16. MS H 46 r. Two sketches relating tothe viola organista, and a map of a river,perhaps for a project of canalization.

8.r7. MS H 45 v. Sketch of a viola organistawith details of construction.

8.18. CA 21-3 va. Construction details for aviola organista.

8.19. Detail of illus. 8.r8.8.2o. MS H to4 v. Drawing for a compact form

of the viola organista.8.2r. CA 34 rb. Drawing of viola organista

(at bottom) and many other constructiondetails.

8.22. Lower part of page, Madrid MS II folio76 r, with sketches for a simplifiedversion of the viola organista (see illus.ro.8 for a whole page).

8.23. MS B 5ov. Sketch of drivingmechanismof the viola organista.

8.24. Escape mechanism of a clock with crownwheel (diagram by the author).

8.25. Clockwork with escape mechanism.From the intarsias in the choir stalls ofMonte Oliveto, by Fra Giovanni daVerona.

9.r. CA 355 rc. Mechanized kettledrum.9.2. Madrid MS I folio r5o r. Mechanized

kettledrum.9.3. CA 3r9 rb. Drums driven by carriage

wheels.

9.4. CA 3o6 va. Mechanized drum activatedby crank and/or carriage wheels.

9.5. Pair of kettledrums and two cylindricaldrums. From Virdung, Musica getutscht,Basel, r5rr.

9.6. Arundel 263 (BM) 136 r. Detail: set ofgradated, small kettledrums withbeaters.

9.7. Monochord. The two stopping bridgespermit two tones to be producedsimultaneously on a single shing.Woodcut from Lodovico Fogilano'sMusica theoica, 1529.

9.8. Arundel zg (BM) r75 r.

9.8A. Arundel 263 (BM) r75 r. Detail.9.8B. Arundel 263 @M) r75 r. Detail.9.8C. Arundel253 (BM) r75 r. Detail.9.8D and 9.8E. Arundel263 (BM) t75 r.

Detail.9.8F and 9.8G. Arundel zg (BM) q5 r.

Detail.9.8H. Arundel 263 (BM) t75 r. Detail.9.8]. Arundel 263 (BM) r75 r. Detail.9.8K. Arundel263 (BM) r75 r. Detail.


9.9. From Virdung, Musica getutscht.

9.ro. Old woman with pot drum; woodcutby Tobias Stimmer, sixteenth century.

9.rr. Frans Hals the Elder, The RommelpotPlayer. Richmond, Collection SirHerbert Cook.

9.r2. Detail from P. Breughel theElder, TheCombat befu,een Carnioal and Lent.Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.

9.r3. MS zqTBib. Nat. C r.9.r4. Madrid MS II, folio 75 v. Detail: bell

with z hammers and a mechanism of4 dampers.

ro.r. MS zqTBib. Nat. D r. Two realisticpipes, one single and one double, andthree bizarre bone daggers.

ro.z. Codice Arundel 263 (BM) 136 r. Sketchesfor toy instruments and scores.

ro.3. Madrid MS I folio 9r v. Cylindrical snaredrum operated bv pinbarrel cylinder.

rr.r. CA 397 rb.Detail: recorders with sideslits instead of finger holes for glissandoeffect.

u.z. Quademi d'Anatomia V 17 r: Sketchof larynx.

rr.3. Quaderni d'Anatomia V 16 r: Sketchof neck with larynx.

rr.4. Arundel 263 (BM) r75 r, sketches ofnew key mechanisms for windinstruments.

tr.5. Windsor AN. A r9oo9r (Aror), drawingsof the tendons of the hand.

n.6. Windsor AN. A 19oo9v (Arov),drawings of the finger with thecords for straightening and bending.

n.7. Transverse flute by Theobald Bcihmwith complete kev system. MetropolitanMuseum of Art, 23.273.

r.8. Madrid MS II folio 76 r.r.9. Fama with quadruple trumpet, in a

tapestry depicting the Triumph of Fame,North French or Flemish, sixteenthcentury. Metropolitan Museum of Art,4r.167.2.

u.ro. Positive organ with alternating bellows,from the Unicorn Tapestries, aboutr5oo. Cluny Museum, Paris.

rr.n. Angel musician playing an organetto.Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Florence.

rr.rz. Angel playing an organetto with a largesingle bellows on the back of the in-strument. Detail of the organ panelsfrom Ndjera by Hans Memling, ca.1455. Art Museum, Antwerp.

r.r3. Angels, one of whom plays an organettowith two alternating bellows. Relief by


Agostino di Duccio, ca. 146o. RiminiCathedral.

rz.r. Detail from Pollaiuolo's tomb for SixtusIY, 1489. Significantly, Pollaiuoloadded to the traditional seven artesliberalis three more, among them, for thefirst time, Prospettiva. Prospettiva, for

xv

its mathematical background, was usedby Leonardo to claim for painters, here-tofore regarded only as artisans, thestatus of scholars.

r3.r Sketch of profiles. Windsor rzz76v.r3.2. Study for Madonna and Child zt:ith St.

John. rNindsor rzz76 r.

?ref ace

In the translations of Leonardo da Vinci's language, smoothness would often notbeappropriate, particularly if it damages or diminishes or blurs the originality of hismessage or the novelty of his observations. Here I have aimed at the maximumclarity of his own language, even at the cost of style. Therefore I do not necessarilyfeel bound to the translations by Richter and MacCurdy.* In some cases Leonardo'soriginal Italian is reprinted to enable the reader to evaluate the English translation.

In his notebooks Leonardo several times mentions books and scripts of his,including some on music, which have not come down to us; it is probable that heonly planned to write them or did not finish them. On the other hand, the recentdiscovery of seven hundred pages of his writings, known as the Madrid Codices,warns us against premafure assumptions that they are lost forever. At any rate, inthe present volume devoted to Leonardo and music it seems appropriate to listtreatises on musical subjects written or planned by him but not known to exist.t

Windsor AN. B 79oj7 (B zo v), Brizio p. a53, Esche p. 7r7, Richter paragraph797, O'Mall"y 7r, contain Leonardo's plans for a comprehensive book on anatomy,listing an elaborate program ranging from the conception and birth of human beingsto detailed descriptions of bones, muscles, vessels, and nerves. He called uponhimself to explore "perspective through the function of sight, and. . . hearing. Youwill speak of music and treat of other senses. Then describe the nature of the fivesenses." This was probably written in 1489.

Quaderni d'Anatomia IV ro r: Confusion has arisen about whether Leonardowrote a book on musical instruments or whether he just quoted from such a book byanother author. The divergence stems from Quaderni d'Anatomia IV ro r, whereLeonardo interrupts his discussion about the noise produced by cannons and theinfluence of their length upon pitch by referring to the fact that this matter has been

"Jean-Paul Richter, TheLiteraryWorks of Leonardo daVinci (London: Oxford University Press, 1939)and Edward MacCurdy, The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (London: ]onathan Cape, 1938).

tThe most comprehensive recent discussion of the problem of lost and planned but not writtentreatises of Leonardo is found in Augusto Marinoni's contribution to The Llnknown Leonardo (New York:McGraw-Hill, 1974): "The Writer, Leonardo's Literary Legacy."

xvll

xv11l PREFACE

fully treated in the book on musical instruments. The paragraph with this passage israther pale in Leonardo's original script, yet it clearly says:

E in questo pii non mi stenterd perchd nel libro delli strumenti armonici ne ho trattato assaicopiosamente.

I shall not go into this at greater length because I have fully treated it in the book on musicalinstruments.

It is not clear from the translation by MacCurdy whether Leonardo refers to a bookby another author or one written by himself. Richter (p. Zo) says ne ho trattato ("1have treate d");Brizio (Scritti Scelti, [Turin, ag52], p. 5o2) reads n'b trattato ("has beentreated"), which does not correspond to the original text. Therefore, it is probablethat here, as in many other cases, Leonardo refers to a book already planned in hismind but not written for lack of time.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTSFor generous support of my research, I am grateful to the American PhilosophicalSociety, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the Heinemann Foun-dation.

My sincere thanks go to the late Professor Ladislao Reti, who, after his re-discovery of the two Leonardo Codices in the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid, kindlyhelped me to obtain the rich organological material therein that was relevant to mybook; to Professors Augusto Marinoni and Carlo Pedretti for valuable informationand exchanges of opinion leading to correct interpretations of sketches for new andfantastic musical instruments; also to Professor Marinoni for his kind permission toreproduce some of his interpretations of Leonardo's picture rebuses.

As so often before, I owe special thanks to my colleague at the MetropolitanMuseum of Art, Dr. Olga Raggio, who, in innumerable discussions, helped me toclarify tricky problems in Leonardo's peculiar Latin and capricious Italian.

May I thank the Biblioteca Comunale of Lodi and its staff for kind help in myresearch on the relations between Franchino Gaffurius and Leonardo, and the lateMonsignore Angelo Ciceri of the Venerabile Fabbrica del Duomo di Milano forenthusiastic support of my examination of works by Gaspar van Weerbecke andother composers contemporary with Leonardo. With Bo Lawergren, professor ofphysics at Hunter College, I had many interesting and helpful conversations aboutLeonardo's inventions of musical instruments, and on the chapter on acousticalexperiments. He also helped considerably in shaping the index.

May I express my gratitude to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, my workingplace for no less than forty-two years, and for the use of its magnificent library and,for illustrations, its photographic collection and slide library; to Miss Janet Byrne,of the Museum's Print Department, for her kind help with illustrations; and alsoto the Gabinetto Fotografico, Florence, for photographs.

Many thanks are due to the Yale University Press, above all to Edward Trippfor his constructive optimism and helpful conversations about the form of the script,and to Maura Tantillo for her speedy and exact editing of a difficult text.

LEONARDO'S MANUSCRIPTSREFERRED TO IN THIS BOOK

Abbrasiation Description andlor location

MSS A through M Institut de France, ParisArundel z$ (BM) British MuseumCA Codice Atlantico, Ambrosiana, MilanForster I, II, III Forster Codices, Victoria and Albert

Museum, LondonMadrid MS I, II Biblioteca Nacional, MadridMetropolitan Museum Drawing at Metropolitan Museum of Art,

New YorkQuaderni d'Anatomia I-VI 6 volumes of anatomical drawings in

Royal Library, Windsor (sometimesreferred to as Anatomical MS. C)

TP Trattato della Pittura, Codex Urbinas,Vatican Library

Triv. Codex Trivulzio, Castello Sforzesco,Milan

Windsor Folios in Royal Library, WindsorWindsor AN. A, B 2 manuscripts of anatomical drawings

in Royal Library, Windsor (Fogli dell'Anatomia A and B)

MS zq7 Bib. Nat. Institut de FranceMS zo38 Bib. Nat. Institut de France

x1x

lnfroduction

"Musica, la Figurazione delle cose Invisibili"

-LroNenoo, Paragone

Was Leonardo also a musician? If he was, how can we explain that this importantfacet of his genius has been neglected? In fact the towering and ever-growingmountain of Leonardo literature does not contain a systematic analysis of Leonar-do's musical interests but onlv some occasional, superficial attempts by art histo-rians not versed in musical history and the environment of Leonardo. Yet Leonar-do's manuscripts contain a large body of musical thoughts, ideas, experiments, andinventions, a cosmos indeed, for these are not isolated but interrelated and inte-grated in many ways.

There are also a great number of testimonials from Leonardo's contemporariesand from the following generation extolling him as a supreme musician. Could allthis be legend?

One major obstacle in the rediscovery of Leonardo as a musician is the fact thatno written composition of his has come down to us and, in all probability, neverexisted. He was an improviser, and it was not customary for improvisers of Leonar-do's time to confide their music to paper. Thus it is not surprising that modernmusical historians have little interest in the rich and subtle culture of improvisationof the late quattrocento and early cinquecento. Still, had they patiently gonethrough the thousands of pages in Leonardo's notebooks, they might have beenastonished by the wealth of musical material, sketches, inventions, and sugges-tions.

As for the art historians, why should they spend much time on Leonardo'smusical interests if they were not of sufficient importance to the historians of music?

Leonardo was, in fact, profoundly occupied with music. He was a performerand teacher of music; he was deeply interested in acoustics and made many experi-ments in this field that had immediate bearing on music; he wrestled with theconcept of musical time, and he invented a considerable number of ingenious musi-cal instruments and made improvements on existing ones. He also had some highlyoriginal ideas about the philosophy of music that were intimately connected with hisphilosophy of painting. It is characteristic that in his Paragone, which forms anintroduction to his Treatise on Painting, he accorded music the highest place among

xxl

xx11 INTRODUCTION

the arts after painting. If we knew nothing of his classification of music other than hisremark calling lt "figurazione delle cose invisibili" (the shaping of the invisible), wewould have a clear indication of the depth and originality of his musical thought.

Leonardo's involvement with music was not one facet, one particle amongmany others, of his creative power but an essential, indispensable, integral, organicpart of the whole structure of his scientific-artistic energy, interrelated with themany other aspects that the universe had for him. Music-as an activity as well asthe subject of meditation-is an elemelt ofhis forma mentis or, as he might have said,

figurazione dellamente. The interpenetration of this element, music, with many of hisother activities and studies is the theme of this book.

May I illustrate this by a few examples?Ingredients of music, that is, acoustical phenomena (such as echo) are ex-

plored, often in analogy to the behavior of light, as contributions to theoreticalphysics.

Proportion theory is enriched by the concept of a perspective of sound inanalogy to proportion in the visual realm.

Anatomy, the study of the living organism as a machine, provides him with anopportunity for creating new or better musical instruments, for instance, in theimage of the larynx and its cartilage rings; or by the imitation of hand and fingertendons for the construction of keys for wind and other instruments.

In the colorful masks, processions, and stage plays in which Leonardo partici-pated as organizer, designer, and stage engineer, he must have enthusiasticallywelcomed the opportunity to adapt himself to the music that permeated the visualphantasmagories and even did construct fantastic instruments for the occasion.

Finally, esthetics: in his Paragone Leonardo found another opportunity to re-late music to the other spatial and temporal arts. The Paragone was the customarymore or less learned discussion of the comparative rank of painting, sculpture,poetry, and music held in summer gardens by circles of courtiers with philosophicalpretensions.

Renaissance painting, despite the development of linear perspective on exactmathematical foundations, was not yet considered one of the liberal arts. Why notelevate it to the rank of music, which since antiquity, by virtue of its mathematicalbasis, was one of the sisters of the quadrivium, together with arithmetic, geometry,and astronomy?

Leonardo's musical talent was attested to by contemporaries or near contem-poraries: Luca Pacioli, the Anonimo Gaddiano, Paolo Giovio, Benvenuto Cellini,and, soon after, Vasari and Lomazzo.

The great mathematician Luca Pacioli, whose relation with Leonardo is de-scribed in chapter z, calls Leonardo "degnissimo pictore, prospectivo, architecto,musico."

The Codice del Anonimo Gaddiano (Cod. Magliabecchiano 17), abook owned byAntonio Billi, written between 15o6 and r53z (published by Carl V. Fabiczy in ArchStor. Ital. in 1893) says:

Fu eloquente nel parlare, et raro sonatore di lira et fu maestro di quella d'Atalante Migliorotti.

INTRODUCTION

Leonardo was an eloquent speaker and an outstanding player of the lira [da braccio] and alsothe teacher in lira playing of Atalante Migliorotti.

Dal detto Magnifico Lorenzo fu mandato al duca di Milano a presentarli insieme con AtalanteMigliorotti una lira, che unico era in sonare tale extrumento.

From Lorenzo the Magnificent [Medici], he was sent to the Duke of Milan [Lodovico il Moro,of the Sforza familyJ to present to him, together with Atalante Migliorotti, a lira, since he wasunique in playing this instrument.

Paolo Giovio Q4$-t552), who wrote Leonardo's vita twenty years after themaster's death, says:

Fuit ingenio valde, comi nitido, liberali, vultu autem longe venustissimo; et cum elegantiaeomnis delitiarumque maxime theatralium mirificus inventor ac arbiter esset, ad liramquescyte caneret, cunctis per omnem aetatem principibus mire placuit.

He had an extraordinary power of mind [he was of extraordinary genius]; he was gracious

[friendlyJ, precise, and generous, with a radiant, graceful appearance [expression]; and sincehe was a magic inventor and connoisseur of all subtleties and delights for the stage, andplayed the lira [lira da braccio] rvith the bow [scythe] he miraculously pleased all the princesthrough his whole life.

Benvenuto Cellini, n'ho owned a manuscript copy of Leonardo's Treatise on

Painting, refers in his autobiography, begun in Florence in 1558, to Leonardo as"painter, sculptor, architect, philosopher, musician; a veritable angel incarnate."

Giorgio Vasari in his Vite refers twice to Leonardo's musical activities. The Viteappeared in two editions, the first in r55o, the second, revised and enlarged, in 1568.

I quote from the second edition (Vasari, ed. Milanesi [Sansoni, ago6l, vol. 4, p. r8):

Dette alquanto d'opera alla musica; ma tosto si risolvd a imparare a suonare la lira, comequello che dalla natura aveva spirito elevatissimo e pieno di leggiadria, onde sopra quellacantd divinamente all improvviso.

[He] devoted much effort to music; above all, he determined to learn playing the lira, since bynature he possessed a lofty and graceful spirit; he sang divinely, improvising his ownaccompaniment on the lira.

Vasari (vol. 4, p. 28) also relates:

Awenne che morto Giovan Galeazzo duca di Milano, e creato Lodovico Sforza nel gradomedesimo l'anno 1494, fu condotto a Milano con gran riputazione Lionardo al duca, il qualemolto si dilettava del suono della lira, 1 perche sonasse; e Lionardo porto quello strumentoch'egli aveva di suo mano fabbricato d'argento gran parte in forma d'un teschio di cavallo,cosa bizzarca e nuova, acciocche l'armonia fosse con maggior tuba e piu sonora di voce;laonde superd tutti i musici che quivi erano concorsi a sonare. Oltra cio, fu il migliore dicitoredi rime all'improvviso del tempo suo.

r. Ludwig Goldscheider, in Leonardo da Vinci (Vienna: Phaidon, a954, p.9, uses an Englishtranslation of Vasari which reads, "to play the lute [sicl], in which the prince greatly delighted" (a

frequent mistake in translations because the translators did not know what to do with llra).

xxlll

xxlv IN TRO D UCT IO N

It came about that the Duke of Milan, Giovan Galeazzo, died and that Lodovico Sforza wasestablished as his successor in the year 1494. At that time Leonardo, with great fanfare, wasbrought to the duke to play for him, since the duke had a great liking for the sound of the lira;and Leonardo brought there the instrument which he had built n ith his own hands, madelargely of silver, in the shape of a horse skull-a bizarre, nen, thing-so that the soundll'armonia) would have greater loudness and sonority; with this, he surpassed all the musi-cians who came there to play. In addition, he was the best improviser of rhymes of his time.

Apart from the detailed description of the lyre, the most interesting statementhere is the accent on the fact that Leonardo went to Milan for musical reasons, to playthe lira for the duke. Could it be that Leonardo--who, in his application for aposition at the Milan court, referred so strongly to the duke's plan for the giantbronze equestrian monument for his (the duke's) father-thought it a good idea toremind the duke, by a new and bizarre idea of a horse-skull instrument, of hisfamiliarity with horse anatomy?2

We should also mention the treatises of the Milanese painter Giovanni PaoloLomazzo (1538-16oo), especially his Trattato dell 'arte della pittura (r;8+) and ldea deltempio della pittura (rSgo). But they repeat largely secondhand information and I willquote here only one interesting suggestion contained in the sixth book of his Trattatodell 'arte della pittura because it is symptomatic of the sixteenth-centun, traditionregarding Leonardo as an outstanding master of the art of musi c. Lomazzo suggeststo painters various allegorical subjects appropriate for the decoration of musicalinstruments, for instance, the nine choirs of music, each devoted to another kind ofinstrument and each represented by three outstanding masters of these instru-ments. Now the fourth choir, devoted to the lira, is reserved to "Leonardo Vincipittore" and to two other virtuosi "certainly not unknown to you: Alfonso da Ferraraand Alessandro Striggio mantovano."

In his ldea del tempio della pittura Lomazzo describes in great detail a nobleedifice to be erected to honor Italy as well as the art of painting, and to exhibit insidethe statues of seven Gooernatori dell'Arte, each made of a different metal symbolic oftheir character and their art. The artists chosen were to be Michelangelo (lead),Gaudenzio Ferrari (tin), Caravaggio (iron), Raphael (brass), Mantegna (quicksilver),Titian (silver), and Leonardo (gold, to reveal his splendor).

Contrary to the enthusiastic admiration of Leonardo's musicianship by hiscontemporaries and the generation following, the Leonardo scholars in our centurydo not mention music at all or content themselves at best with quoting remarks byVasari.3 Thus an example is Ludwig Heydenreich, Leonardo da Vinci (Berlin, 7g4)),

z. The application, of which only a draft survives, states, after an enumeration of Leonardo'smany talents, " . . . again the bronze horse may be taken in hand, which is to be to the immortal gloryand eternal honor of the prince, your father of happy memory, and of the illustrious house of sforza."

3. In the mid-nineteenth century, Jacob Burckhardt, who in several of his writings (for instance,his Cicerone [Basel, 1855], p. 866) devotes some of his most clairvoyant and monumental language todrawing a profile of Leonardo's personality, does not fail to mention in the Cicerone (p. 859) ihatLeonardo "als Musiker und Improvisator bertihmt war [was famous as a musician and improviser],"evidently on the testimony of Giovio and Vasari. Burckhardt was himself a well-trained musician,

INTRODUCTION

one of the classical treatises on Leonardo's life and work. Sir Kenneth Clark'sLeonardo da V inci, An Account of his D ea elopment as an Ar tist (Cambridg e, a93g; rev. ed.a958), one of the most perceptive books written about Leonardo the artist, is anexception. Clark repeats Vasari's report of Leonardo's first visit to the Milanese courtand speaks of a "silver lyre [slc] in the form of a horse's head (testa) [sicl." There aretwo inaccuracies: the silver lyre was a lira da braccio, and it was not shaped like a

horse's head but a horse's skull (cranio). But this is followed by a very imaginativesentence: "Since we can no longer hear the music which Leonardo produced fromthe lyre, we are inclined to assume that it was less important than his drawings andpicfures, but to his contemporaries it may have seemed the reverse." Certainly hiscontemporaries-and among them good musicians-could not have given himhigher acclaim than they did. Benvenuto Cellini and Lomazzo sttTl sounded a strongecho of it.

The excellent book by Roberto Marcolongo, Leonardo daVinci, artista, scienziato(Milan, a95o), contains an interesting analysis of Leonardo's scientific achievementsbut has nothing to say about Leonardo's musical thoughts and activities, beyondmentioning that Leonardo was an excellent player of the "cetra" (a term meaningeither the ancient Greek kithara or the Renaissance cittern) and that he constructedvarious musical instruments and the monochord-an obvious misunderstandingbecause the monochord goes back to antiquity.

The admirable survey of publications about Leonardo by Anna Maria Brizio,"Rassegna" (in L'Arte, ;968, pt. I), includes the statement: "Properly speaking, thestudies on Leonardo and music do not belong in the category of his scientific studies.. . ." Would, then, music, and Leonardo's concern with this art and its acousticalfoundations, have no place among his multifarious interests and activities?

J. P. Richter,inTheLiteraryWorksof LeonardodaVinci (London, zded.,7g3g,pp.69-8t), a formidable contribution when it appeared and still indispensable, includesremarks about Leonardo's "lyra," his other instruments, his statements on soundand voice, and his comparison of painting and music. Inevitably, the practice ofimprovisation was not fully understood in Richter's time, and most of the instru-ments mentioned, such as the viola organista and the zither, were not recognized forwhat they actually were.

pianist, and singer (see the epilogue to his Wellgeschichtliche Betrachtungen, ed. Rudolf Marx (Kroner,L%).

During one of my visits to Basel between the two world wars, I visited the house of Burckhardt.An elderly caretaker who had been employed there during Burckhardt's last years showed me around.His remarks about Burckhardt's musical inclinations are unforgettable: "When Herr Professor wastired or wanted to be alone, he withdrew into the 'piano corner' and played Welsche Weisen." Whatsounded like "Welsche Weisen" to the caretaker was in all probability Mozart, Burckhardt's idol. It ischaracteristic that in the section "Greatness in History" in Weltgeschichtliche Betrachtungen he re-peatedly cites Mozart as an example. We know from students of Burckhardt that he used to improviseand to sing songs by Schubert to his own accompaniment.

PART I

ROOTS AND GROVTTH

Musical environment, traditions andtrends, musical friends, exchange of ideas

CHAPTER ONE

N[wsical LifeinJlorence and N[tlan

Before we consider Leonardo's many musical achievements and interests, it may beappropriate to envisage him not as an isolated individual but in the midst of themusical circles and atmospheres in which he lived, in order to understand theimpact that his musical environment had upon him. This will best be done byreminding the reader of the musical life in Florence and Milan and showing Leonar-do's relation to four friends who had an intimate affinity with music, each in adifferent way: one a composer and teacher of music, Gaffurius; one a mathematicianand philosopher, Pacioli; one a famous builder of musical instruments, LorenzoGusnasco da Pavia; and one a disciple of Leonardo in the art of improvisation on thelira da braccio, Atalante Migliorotti.

Of the musical education of Leonardo during his early years in Florence, fewfacts are known, but it is beyond all doubt that the intense musical life there at histime, at court, at church, and among artisans and peasants, must have influencedhim deeplv and lastingly.

There exists such a wealth of sacred and secular music and musical treatises,biographical material, and reports of festivities, processions, and theatrical perfor-mances at the Medici court that a musical panorama of Florence in the second half ofthe quattrocento is not needed here.

One important fact related to Leonardo's early musical instruction is found inVasari. Vasari's biography of Andrea del Verrocchio begins with a list of his gifts andactivities: "Andrea del Verrocchio, fiorentino, fu ne' tempi suoi orefice, prospettivo,scultore, intagliatore, pittore e musico [. . . n'as goldsmith, connoisseur of perspec-tive, sculptor, engraver, painter, and musician]."

Leonardo worked as an apprentice in Verrocchio's workshop from aboutr467to 1476. In t47z he was accepted into the compdnia de San Luca, the artists' guild inFlorence. There he absorbed his earliest instruction in many arts, and Vasari's inclu-sion of music among Verrocchio's talents answers a question never asked by arthistorians or music historians: where and when the young Leonardo became famil-iar with the craft of music.l

Inr48z, when Leonardo decided, at the age of thirty, to leave Florence to enterthe service of Lodovico Sforza,Il Moro, Duke of Milan, his musical abilities musthave played a significant role if we believe the report of Vasari. However, the

r. True, Vasari was often maligned for adding complimentary material freely into The Life ot'Artists. At least as far as music was concerned, I do not think that he deserved this criticism. Going

4 MUSICAL LIFE IN FLORENCE AND MILAN

preserved draft of Leonardo's letter to the duke applying for employment andoffering his gifts as a military engineer, and incidentally as an architect, sculptor,and painter, does not mention music. But it alludes significantly to Il Moro's plan forthe equestrian monument for his father.

When Leonardo left the town of the Medicis to begin a new life in Milan, hemust have found a totally different environment in the rich, aggressive, and po-litically ambitious city. It attracted him chiefly as a military engineer and for theopportunity to participate in the planning of novel military projects, new types offortifications, waterworks such as canals and irrigation, new types of artillery, andalso another enorrnous project in the field of bronze casting-the giant equestrianmonument in honor of Francesco Sforza.

The Capella del Duomo, which reached back to 1402, assumed an internationalcharacter under Galeazzo Maria Sforza, who between 146o and r47o employedFrench musicians, of whom the greatest was ]osquin Des Prez.

In 473 Galeazzo established his private chapel at the court and employed allforeign musicians of the Capella del Duomo. Its leader was Antonio Guinati, and hisassistant, Gasparo van Weerbecke. Gaffurius tried to strengthen the Capella delDuomo and substantially increased the body of the singers.

He inevitably must have compared the spiritual level of the court of the Sforzaswith that of the Medicis. There was no Marsilio Ficino here, little Neoplatonic tradi-tion, and no Politian. Did Leonardo miss the unparalleled intensity of the Florentinehumanist tradition and resent the lesser emphasis in Milan on the renascence of theculture of the ancients? We may never know. The artistic ideals and guides inherentin classical antiquity were probably less important to him than to most of his greatartist-contemporaries. Leonardo w,as not an archaeologist, as were Raphael, GulioRomano, and Filippino Lippi. On the other hand Milan rvas an international centerfor music and other arts. Famous German architects collaborated in the colossal taskof the building of the Duomo.

Music in Milan, in the last third of the quattrocento, n'as intenselv alive and fullof radical innovations that certainly must have affected Leonardo. Nearer thanFlorence to the sources of transalpine polyphony, Milan had become a melting pot inmore than one regard. There was the antagonism and also fusion between localItalian homophonic tradition and the new Flemish and French polyphonic style;there were new compromises and mutual stimuli. A similar process of osmosis wenton between sacred and secular music, specifically between the Capella del Duomofavoring the national Italian style, and the private chapel of the Duke, favoring theforeigners such as Josquin, Agricola, Jaquotin, Cordier, and Compdre.

through the Vi fe again and again for years, I found that he was completely reliable; if he called Raphael,Giorgione, Titian, and many others musicians, we have no right to doubt it. Whoever visits his housein Arezzo can convince himself of Vasari's interest in music by looking at his frescoes on the walls. Andmost important, in his description of musical scores in paintings of the masters he will not restrict him-self to enumerating the instruments of the angels but often explains a detail that only a musicalconnoisseur could observe-for instance, that in a sacra conoersazione, one angel plays, another tunes,and a third one waits for this entry.

CHAPTER TWO

jaffwriws and ?acioli

GAFFURIUS

Gaffurius, or as his friends called him, Franchino, was an almost exact contempo-rary of Leonardo. He was bom in 1451, one year before Leonardo, in Lodi, an old andbeautiful town southeast of Milan, with a hospitable library at the Chiesa dell'Incoronata, still proudlv preserving his books.l He died six years after Leonardo, inr5zz. Educated in the Benedictine Cloister of Lodivecchio and destined to become apriest, he returned to secular life for several years before being ordained in1473 or474. He studied musical theory with the Carmelite monk of Flemish origin, Johan-nes Goodendag (Bonadies), and, after a short time as a singer at the Cathedral ofLodi, he began to teach musical theory in Mantua at the court of the Gonzagas andwas called as a teacher and composer to Genoa by the Doge Adorno. For politicalreasons he left for Naples, where, under the influence of Flemish musicians, aboveall the famous Johannes Tinctoris, he continued his theoretical studies. In r48oCaffurius completed his first great treatise, Theoricum Opus Musicae Disciplinae, fa-mous, among other things, for its beautiful woodcuts. Probably because of the blackplague, he left Naples and returned to Lodi, where the bishop employed him as ateacher of young singers of sacred music; there he began his second great treatise,the Practica Musicae.In 1483 he was called to Bergamo as Maestro della Capella delDuomo and completed there his Practica, which, however, was published onlymuch later, in 496 in Milan.

In484 he was elected to the prestigious position of Maestro della Capella delDuomo di Milano and stayed there, interrupted only by small journeys, for the restof his life, thirty-eight years . In r49z he became Professor Musicae at the MilaneseGymnasium, established shortly before by the Duke Lodovico Moro. Among otherfamous teachers at the gymnasium was Luca Pacioli, the great mathematician (see

p. 1o). Gaffurius' third great treatise, De Harmonia Musicorum lnstrumentorurn, com-

r. Ten years ago, when I visited Lodi, the staff of the library and of the Museo Civico helped mewith greatest courtesy in my research on Gaffurius.

6 cAFFURIUS AND PACIoLI

pleting the Trilogia Gaffuriana, was written later, in r5oo, and published in r5r8, afterLeonardo's death, in France. Gaffurius was elected to teach music at the venerableUniversity of Pavia, which at the time had the only chair of music at any Italianuniversity, then lauded as a remarkable innovation.

If one is eager to trace Gaffurius' personal relations with Leonardo, one isamply rewarded. Gaffurius worked in Milan from 1484 until his death in t5zz.Leonardo lived in Milan from 1483 to 1499,2 and again from 15o6 until his departurefor Rome and other cities in r5r3; thus they were together in Milan for no fewer thantwenty-two years. The fact that Gaffurius' duties were at the cathedral, whileLeonardo was closely integrated into the rich social and artistic life of the court withits stage performances, feasts, concerts, and other divertissements, did not preventan exchange of musical ideas and opinions. Gaffurius did not disdain to writesecular music in the new style for the court.

In these twenty-two years there were beyond doubt close friendlv relationsbetween Leonardo and Gaffurius. A musical pioneer of the wide and profoundknowledge of Gaffurius, who combined the local Italian tradition with the subtletiesof Netherlandish counterpoint as a former disciple of Goodendag and Tinctoris,must have been of great interest to Leonardo. They lent each other books. Gaffuriuscould not have failed to be impressed by Leonardo's mastery of improvisation on thelira da braccio, and he must have admired Leonardo's activity as organizer of feasts,theatrical spectacles, and concerts at the ducal court. Leonardo may also have beencurious to acquaint himself with Gaffurius' specific attitude toward the theory ofproportions and numerical ratios. At the time that he wrote the Practica, Gaffuriusworked also on a treatise Proportioni Practicabili, which was never published. Thetitle alone evokes relations with Pacioli's DioinaProportione and the wide space givenin Leonardo's Paragone to the role of proportions in the structure of works of artincluding the art "in time," music.3

One is tempted, of course, to scan Gaffurius' Trilogia for technical informati,onabout the practice of improvisation. In the Practica, the most down-to-earth ofGaffurius'treatises, we observe a repudiation of orthodox modal writing and also acertain simplification of rigorous contrapuntal rules in favor of vertical elements oftexture, that is, of chordal style, all in line with the easier, less complicated, informalItalian tradition of the Capella del Duomo. In short, the style must have been identi-cal with, or close to, what was practiced by Leonardo as an improviser and by otherimprovisers. Incidentally, Gaffurius, apart from his outstanding role as a theorist ofmusic, was a fruitful composer of sacred and secular music. The extant works fillthree codices preserved in the library of the Milan Cathedral. It wouldbe beyond thescope of this book to analyze the variety of his compromises between the Italian andFlemish styles, and it may be a pity that the theorist has so overshadowed thecomPoser.

z. After the French captured Milan in 1499, Leonardo, who was of course identified with theSforza court, soon left for Mantua, Venice, and Florence

3. See chap. rz.

GAFFURIUS AND PACIOLI

And if all this suggests, by way of inference, Gaffurius' approval of certainimprovisation practices, we find an even stronger argument at the end of the thirdbook of his Practica, in which the lira da braccio as an improvisation instrument isdirectlv quoted as an example:

Moreover, a cithara or lyre player should use the tones of the lyre to express the concordu'hich arises from harmonious strings, and from these tones produce consonant melodies inseveral rvays, either by playing a tenor part on the strings and singing the cantus, or viceversa; also by relating the thinness of one tone to the denseness of the other, the rapidity ofone to the slowness of the other, and the highness of one to the lowness of the other, so thattogether they will establish one entirely unified consonance, just as it has been done in thepractice of the art and was established in Book 7 of Laws by Plato. For he says that allr.ariations of rhythm are adapted to the tones of the lyre.a

The use of lyra and cithara in this passage of Gaffurius requires a clarification.The terminology of musical instruments in the quattrocento appears confused andconfusing to later times. Different instruments are often given the same name; someinstruments have several names; contemporary instruments are projected back intoGreek antiquity, and Greek names are directly appended to quattrocento instru-ments. We find the terms lyra,lira, and cythara; each of these terms has more thanone meaning. They may connote the plectrum-plucked famous stringed instrumentof classical Greek antiquity, familiar to Leonardo's leamed contemporaries fromGreek literature, that is, from poets, philosophers, or writers on music; but they mayalso indicate modern instruments of Leonardo's time.

The present-day reader cannot hope to discover the meaning from dictionariesbut only from the historic context and environment. When Gaffurius speaks ofcontemporary usage in his Practica, he often means by "lyra" and "cythara" thebowed lira da braccio (later called by Vincenzo Galilei "lira moderna"). The situationbecomes even more confusing to the modern reader because the lira da braccio of thequattrocento was often identified with the xr0cga or l.ugro of the Greeks, chieflybecause of its two open, unstoppable strings. Greek poet-musicians were creditedwith the invention of the bow, evidently because Sappho was believed to haveplayed something like the quattrocento lira da braccio. Similarly in mythologicalstage plays of the quattrocento (or in paintings), when the author of the play in-structed gods or heroes to perform on the "lira," he meant its Renaissance equiva-lent, the lira da braccio. Poliziano, in his Faaola, directs Orpheus to enter Hades withhis "lira," and the protagonist used the lira da braccio as a matter of course. WhenAtalante Migliorotti, a disciple of Leonardo who had studied improvisation on thelira da braccio with him, played Orpheus in the famous repeat performance of

4. "Oportet insuper & Cytharistam Lyricumve concentus exprimendi gratia qui ex canorisfidibus provenit Lyrae vocibus uti: ac vocibus ipsis voces suas alterna diversitate reddere consonas:puta vel fidibus ipsis modulando tenorem: ac voce propria cantum: vel econverso: sive etiam uniusspissitudinem dinem raritati alterius conferendo sive velocitatem tarditati sive acumen gravitati: ita utunum omnino simul consonum servent: quod & artis ratione & septimo legum Divi Platonis institutonoscitur observidum. Is enim inquit universam rythmorum varietatem esse Lyrae vocibus accom-modandam."

8

Poliziano's legenda at the court of Mantua in 1492,

ment," the lira da braccio.s


he used, of course, "his instru-

One male portrait, in the Ambrosiana in Milan, has been considered by arthistorians to be a portrait of Gaffurius, but this seems to be extremely doubtful.Evidently a portrait of a musician from the time when Leonardo and Gaffurius weretogether in Milan, it shows a young man of great character, serious expression, andappealing beauty (illus. z-t).Ifit was painted by Leonardo at all, it w,ould be his onlymale portrait on canvas. Angela Ottino della Chies a, in Leonardo da Vinci (New York:Rizzoli, t967; Abrams, 1969) gives a long list of past suggestions as to authorship.Suida, Berenson, Kenneth Clark, and Heydenreich consider Leonardo to be theartist. Morelli suggests Ambrogio de Predis. A. Venturi, Malaguzzi-Valeri, andothers are undecided.

The "musician" has stirred up many controversies among modern art histo-rians. There is no agreement about the painter, the possible cooperation of painters,or the identity of the sitter.6

Looking for authentic likenesses of Gaffurius, we find, above all, the famouswoodcut showing Gaffurius teaching ex cathedra, surrounded by the Pythagoreanproportion figures and the symbols of measuring time and space (the hourglass anddividers) (illus. z.z). Itwas used in several of his publications. The long face gives theimpression of a realistic portrait.

The Museo Civico of Lodi possesses a profile portrait rvith the title Francus.Gafurus. Laudensis. Musicae. Moderator. against a background of large organ pipes(illus. 2.3). In spite of the inscription it seems difficult to reconcile the features withthose in the woodcut.

However, a miniature portrait used as the frontispiece of the Codice LaudenseXXV[LA.9 shows a somewhat older man teaching (illus. 2.4 and 2.5). It could bereconciled with the face in the woodcut. Two students listening are portrayed on theopposite rim of the frontispiece.

None of the three representations just discussed could easily be reconciledwith the features of the Ambrosiana portrait. However, this would not excludeLeonardo as its painter. The design of the eyes, nose, and mouth, and their relationto the contour of the cheek, are comparable to the feafures in the angel in the Virgin ofthe Rocks. Kenneth Clark has convincingly pointed to the similarity of the modelingof both faces. Also, the treatment of the curls is characteristic of Leonardo's tech-nique.If thepaintingisnotbyLeonardohimself, onecouldthinkof oneof hisclosestdisciples, Ambrogio de Predis.T

5. See p. 84.6. The notes and catalogue by Angela Ottino della Chiesa in The Complete Paintings ot' Leonardo da

Vlncl (New York: Harry N. Abrams, a96il, p.roo, give lists of the various opinions about authorshipand the identity of the sitter.

7. WaldemarvonSeidlitz,inLeonardodnVinci(Vienna:Phaidon-Verlag,ty),p.rz8,believesthat everything points to Giovanni Ambrogio Preda as the painter and he quotes Morelli, who has

attributed the London Madonna to the artist who painted not only both flanking angel musicians butalso the musician's portrait in the Ambrosiana.

2.1. Portrait of a musician, probably by Leonardo da Vinci. Ambrosiana, Milan.

10 GAFFURIUS AND PACIOLI

PACIOLI

Another ingenious friend of Leonardo in his Milanese years and even later was not amusician but a mathematician of international fame, Luca Pacioli. Pacioli was bornabotfir.445 at Borgo San Sepolcro and studied mathematics as a boy in Venice, wherehe later was employed as a tutor for children, teaching mathematics from a treatisethat he himself wrote. He entered the Franciscan order and, after studying theologyand philosoPhy, concentrated on the mathematical sciences, u'riting and teaching inmany cities: Perugia, Venice, Zata, Florence, Rome, and Naples.

In Venice he published in l.494 the first of his famous n'orks, the Summa deArithmetica Geometria Proportione et Proportionalita. Tr- o vears later Lodovico il Morocalled him to Milan and appointed him professor of mathematics. He became afriend of Leonardo, who had already been at the court of the Sforzas since 483.

It is easy to see how they must have attracted each other as scholars and howmuch their interests in the exact sciences complemented one another. Leonardoprofited from Pacioli's familiarity with the history of mathematics from Greek an-tiquity, and Pacioli, on the other hand, must have been astonished by the u'ide useLeonardo made of mathematics, applying it to mechanics, linear perspective, optics,acoustics, anatomy, and to countless experiments in all these fields.

In t499, after the occupation of Milan by the French army, Leonardo and Paciolileft Milan together by way of Mantua for venice, where both stayed together.

The Summa is an encyclopedic synthesis of mathematical thought from Euclidto Regimontanus, with many original contributions such as the calculus on probabil-ity. Besides theoretical sections it contains many practical suggestions and informa-tion, for instance, on double-entry bookkeeping and calculation of interests andrates of exchange.s

Not being a mathematician,e l can say here only a few words about the impulsethis work may have given to Leonardo and about some of the similarities anddivergences between the ideas of the friends about the nature and usefulness ofmathematical thought. Leonardo himself, in the opinion of many mathematiciansfamiliar with his writings and experiments, was a mathematician of genius, al-though some of the laundry and grocery bills interspersed in his learned diariesshow mistakes. His planned book on the science of machines (or what we todaywould call "theoretical mechanics," or more generally, "theoretical physics") wouldnot have been possible without the constant application of mathematics.l0

Often quoted are Leonardo's words, "Mechanics is the paradise of themathematical sciences because by means of it one comes to the fruit of mathematics"

8. For an imaginative and concentrated account of the content and substance of Pacioli's threegreat treatises and their influence upon his time and the history of mathematics, see GiuseppinaMasotti Biggiogero, in De Dioina Proportione de Luca Pacloll Fontes Ambrosiani, 3r (Milan, a956), pp.2rg-33.

9. See the interesting remarks by V. P. Ztrbov, Leonardo da Vinci (Cambridge: Harvard Univer-sity Press, t968), p. 169.

ro. See Arturo Uccelli, Leonardo da Vinci, I Libri di Meccanica (Milan: Hoepli, r94o).

2.2. Woodcut showing Gaffurius teach-ing, used as an illustration in hisAngelicum Opus Musice (Milan, r5o8)

and other of his publications.

2.3. Portrait of Gaffurius. Museo Civico, Lodi.

2.4. Miniature portrait of a teacher, possibly Gaf{urius. Codice Laudense XXV[I.A.9.

2.5. Detail of the portrait. Codice Laudense XXV[I.A.9.


(E 8 v, Institute de France). Or, to quote one of the most striking examples of thisapplication, "A bird is an instrument working according to mathematical law" (CAr6t ra). All Leonardo's mechanisms, from his anatomical interpretations of livingorganisms of humans, animals, and plants to his countless freely invented machinesincluding new musical instruments, are governed by mathematical laws and can beconceived in their operation only through the laws of mathematics. This is true to theextent that even the most fantastic creatures designed by Leonardo, his dragons andother monsters, are constructed with respect to mathematical laws, with their legsand ivings designed and proportioned as parts of a workable machine-that is, ofthe "logical" organism. For the same reason, Leonardo the painter, already whenserving as an apprentice in Verrocchio's workshop in Florence, developed a disgustfor angel wings, evidently because a given set of back and shoulder muscles cannotoperate arms and wings at the same time.

The second of the printed works of Pacioli is his Latin edition of the Elements ofEuclid, published in r5o9 and considered to be by far the best edition since the firstmedieval edition in the thirteenth century.

In the same year (rSog) appeared in Venice the third of his main printed works,the famous De Diaina Proportione,ll which includes in its formidable compass therole of proportions in sciences and arts, that is, in the language of that time, theseven liberal arts. It is divided into three parts: the Compendium de Diaina Proportione,the treatise on architecture, and an Italian translation of Piero della Francesca's De

co rp or ibus r egularibus.Leonardo contributed to Pacioli's Diaina Proportione sixty drawings of

polyhedra. Among them were the platonic "regular bodies," that is, the pyramidsymbolizing fire, the cube symbolizing earth, the octahedron symbolizing air, thedodecahedron symbolizing heaven, and the icosahedron symbolizing water.

Leonardo drew the polyhedra in linear perspective by geometric projection,each polyhedron in two parallel versions: as a solid body (called "solido" by Pacioli)and as a frame or skeleton (called "vacuum" by Pacioli) (illus. 2.6 and 2.7). Thispedagogical device of replacing the planes of the solid body by frames or skeletons isan exact parallel to Leonardo's didactic technique for drawing illustrations for hisanatomical research, for instance, when he replaces muscles by thin cords or wires toobtain a transparent and an intelligible picture of the whole configurationl2(illus. 2.8).

Pacioli thanked Leonardo repeatedly and profusely for his contribution. In anappendix of twenty chapters added to the seventy-one chapters of De Diaina Propor-tione presented to Lodovico il Moro in 1497, Pacioli writes of "the most excellentpainter of perspective, architect, m u s i c i a n, and man learned in all virtues,Leonardo da Vinci, who deduced and elaborated a series of diagrams of regularsolids at the time of his sojourn in Milan [italics mine]." This homage to Leonardo by

rr. See Biggiogero, Dioina Proportione, pp. 2L9-33.rz. See Emanuel Winternitz, "Anatomy the Teacher-On the Impact of Leonardo's Anatomical

Research on his Musical and Other Machines," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 3 (Aug.rg6z).

a3

14 GAFFURIUS AND PACIOLI

a learned friend and humanist is significant for several reasons: it is one of theearliest testimonials to Leonardo's musicianship; it is also interesting because Pacioliselected as merits of Leonardo three of his achievements that imply a mastery of thescience of proportions in art: painting, using linear perspective, architecture, andmusic.

Inhis DeViribusQuantitatis, writtenbetweent4gTandr5o8 (no. z5o,UniversityLibrary, Bologna), Pacioli refers to his De Diaina Proportione and again pays en-thusiastic and tender homage not only to Leonardo the scientist but also to thepainter for his

supreme and very graceful figures of all the Platonic and mathematical regular bodies andderivatives, which it would not be possible to make better in perspectival dran'ing, even ifApelles, Myron, or Polycletus and the others were to return among us, made and shaped bythat ineffable left hand, most fitted for all the mathematical disciplines, of the prince amongthe mortals of today, that first of Florentines, our Leonardo da Vinci, in that happv timewhen we were together in the most admirable city of Milan, working for the same patron.13

Several of Leonardo's drawings of the regular bodies made for Pacioli are found inCA 263 r (illus. 2.9).

It is of great interest to see both Pacioli and Leonardo wrestling with the samenew and fashionable problems of their time, for instance, the doctrine of the liberalarts, although with slightly different results. The time-honored canon throughoutthe Middle Ages and ever since was the bipartition of the seven liberal arts into twogroups, a mathematical one, the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, andmusic), and the trivium (rhetoric, grammar, and dialectics), that is, disciplines of lessexact nature.

In the second half of the fifteenth century this sharp classification wasgradually eroded and other disciplines were added. In his preface to De DiainaProportione (p. ,5), Pacioli explains to the duke that he recognizes as discipline:mathematica, arithmetica, geometria, astrologia, musica, prospectiva, architectura,and cosmographia, thus doubling the number of disciplines contained in the oldcanon. It was Leonardo who had forcefully pleaded for the recognition of linearperspective as a liberal art; for him, the painter was a scientist, and one of his tools,linear perspective, partook of mathematical exactness and therefore belonged withmusic in the quadrivium. Although music, as a science of proportion, had graduallylost its cosmological importance and thereby its central position in philosophicalspeculation, it was the doctrine of proportions that became the preoccupation of thedraftsmen of the quattrocento and their ideal of the rationally, mathematically "cor-rect" portrayal of nature. Linear perspective became one of the new science-arts,

13. "supreme et legiadrissime figure de tutti i platonici et mathematici regulari et dependenti,ch'in prospectivo disegno non d possibile al mondo farli meglio, quando bene Apelle, Mirone, Policletoet gli altri fra noi tornassero, facte et formate per quella ineffabile senistra mano a tutte disciplinemathematici acomodatissima del prencipe oggi fra mortali, pro prima fiorentino, Lionardo nostro daVenci, in quel felici tempo ch'insiemi a medesimi stipendii nella mirabilissima citta di Milano citrovammo."

* \{t\l l}Fl,1'\J .\RlllS\s i ,^ \r\l ln\\ l

: ;r'3r,"!{1e*' !t'<nr

2.6. Drawing of an " icosahedron sol'idtts'

by Leonardo for Pacioli's Dli'iiaProportione.

..r..,..,.,!.,,.'

.-"i' rrlt. .-. .

:'.'..-qa- ' ''

-:.... "'1

' ,1,

2.8. Sketches by Leonardo of a leg rep-resenting the muscles bY wires.

Quaderni d'Anatomia V 4 r.

2.7.

.!-" :.il,'l;i"+ r'-'{*i'

Drawing of an " icosahedron uacuus"by Leonardo for Pacioli's DiztinaProportione.

2.9. Leonardo's drawing of two regular bodies, made for Pacioli. CA 263 t.

r l'ltr''t'' "-'a "

i"'\)l;:.''. j.i, ,. ^

76 GAFFURIUS AND PACIoLI

and Leonardo's plea for its reception among the quadrivium helped the painter toascend from the social level of an artisan to the rank of a scholar, which the musicianhad always enjoyed.

There is a bifurcation of the principal directions of Pacioli and Leonardo.Pacioli remains above all a mathematician, believing in mathematical rigor withoutcompromise, although he admits in De Diaina proportione (p. q)' ,,Mathematicae

enim scientiae sunt in primo grado certifudinis et nafurales sequuntur eas[Mathematics are sciences possessing the first degree of certainty, and the naturalsciences follow theml." Leonardo is above all a natural scientist and philosopher ofnature, and although he admits mathematical thought is indispensable tomechanics, he continuously relies on experiment as the prime method of researchand must often be satisfied with approximate solutions. He searches and thinks interms of proportions of sound, weights, time and its sections, and also of propor-tions of shapes and dimensions of living organisms.la

14. Giorgio Santillana once called Leonardo's mathematics "not contemplation of the pretersen-sual world, but a search for the geometric skeleton of reality" (["L6onard et ceux qu'il n'a pis lus"] inLdonard de Vinci et I'expdrience scientifique au XVI" sricle, Colloques Internationaux [Paris: Presses Univer-sitaires, a9fi1, pp. 3$ ff .).

CHAPTER THREE

$wsnasco nud Migliorotti

GUSNASCO

Another musical friend of Leonardo's was Lorenzo Gusnasco, called Lorenzo da

Pavia from his native town Pavia, just a few miles south of Milan. He was a man ofmany talents and several trades.

He became an outstanding maker of musical instruments of such beauty and

such tone that his fame spread all over Lombardy and Venice. Among his instru-ments were organs, organetti, harpsichords, spinette, clavichords, lutes, viole, cit-terns, and in all probability lire da braccio.

Many letters reveal his service to the greatLombard courts, Milan, Ferrara, and

especially Mantua, whose court was dominated by the art- and music-mindedduchess, La Marchesa Isabella d'Este.1 Gusnasco's correspondence with her began

in the a4gos. Among other things, a lute was commissioned by her with a sound-holerose of ebony and ivory, "perch6 l'ebano e l'avorio sono due belle compagne insieme

[because ebony and ivory make beautiful companions]." But Lorenzo must have

known her personally. We know of his visits to Mantua to deliver directly into her

hands the delicate instruments commissioned by her with individual instructions.In 4g5Isabella reminds him of a beautiful clavichord he had made for her

sister, Beatrice, duchess of Milan, and wants one of equal beauty for herself, adding,however, the special wish:

We want only to request that it should be played easily (that is, with a light touch), for we

have such a light hand that we cannot play well if we have to strain our hand because of the

resistance of the keys. Please understand our wish and what we need: make it in the same

shape as you are accustomed. The faster you serve us, the more we will be pleased.

Isabella was kept informed of the progress of the work. From other letters we learn

more about the intense, sometimes even fierce musical rivalry between the twosisters. At Christmas:.496 Gusnasco delivers the clavichord personally to Isabella in

r. See especially A. Luzio, "Isabella d'Este e la corte Sforza," Architsio Storico Lombardo (r9ol; A.

Luzio and R. Renier, "Delle Relazioni di Isabella d'Este Gonzaga con Lodovico e Beatrice Sfotza,"

Archit:io Storico Lombardo (t89o), PP. 74 ff., 364 ff., 6:14 tl.; A. Luzio and R' Renier, "La cultura e le

relazioni letterarie di lsabella d'Este Gonza ga," Giornale storico della letteratura ltaliana, passim.

a7

18 GUSNASCO AND MIGLIOROTTI

Mantua. Incidentallf , after Beatrice's death in Milan, Isabella managed to acquireher clavichord also.

rnJdy t4gT Isabella requests a lute "adapted to my voice ," but Lorenzo regretsnot being able to oblige her because he cannot find ebony black and beautifulenough. He adds, in his somewhat stilted and subservient style, that he was verydisconsolate because he had wanted badty to make the lute, that he was certain thathe would have made the most beautiful object in Italy or anywhere else, and that hehad been most anxious to please the only person who would have understood thevalue of those objects-a fact that would have inspired him to produce somethingexcellent.

In4g4lorenzo had moved to Venice, evidently because the larger town was amore practical residence for his growing occupation as the trusted, knowledgeable,and shrewd agent of Isabella for procuring works of art and curiosities for hercollection in the castello of Mantua. Among these objects were pictures, rare books,2antiques, gems and cameos, tapestries, Murano glass, amber rosaries, ivorycrucifixes, enamels, crystal mirrors, inlaid cabinets, perfume boxes of crystal andebony, and all kinds of curiosities. But there is good reason to assume that Lorenzoalso continued his workshop for musical instruments in Venice; deliveries after t494are mentioned in the documents after that time.

It was in Venice that Leonardo in 499 stayed with Lorenzo and heard thatLodovico had defeated the French army-good news that was soon replaced by thesad tidings that the French had reentered Milan, sacked the city, and imprisonedLodovico il Moro.

An instrument builder of the rank and originality of Gusnasco must have beenof great interest to Leonardo, who was an admired performer and had constructed agreat number of new and complex musical instruments. In Milan , Pavia, Mantua,and later in Venice there must have been numerous occasions for meetings betweenthe two. Significant is a letter written by the duke of Mantua to his treasurer inDecember 1498. The duke writes from one of his country villas in Goito, instructinghis treasurer to pay "Leonardo the Florentine" eleven ducats for certain strings oflute and vio.l which Leonardo had brought from Milan, and begs him to do this atonce that the master may be able to continue his journey.3 But there were occasionsfor meetings apart from music. Isabella d'Este used Gusnasco as a shrewd andpersuasive intermediary to elicit from Leonardo a promise to paint her portrait.aBecause it was known that Leonardo was deeply involved in scientific projects, shewould, to save time, even content herself with a portrait not after life but after adrawing that Leonardo had done of her some years before, probably the delicatechalk and pastel profile now in the Louvre.s Alas for us, Leonardo resisted and couldnot be persuaded.

z. The workshop of the famous printer of beautiful books, Aldus Manutius, the founder of theAldine Press, opened in Venice in r54o.

3. Lrtzio, Emporium (rgoo), p. 352.4. See letters in Luzio and Renier, "La cultura."5. From Venice Gusnasco wrote to Isabella d'Este: "Leonardo is in Venice and has shown me a

portrait of Your Highness which is exactly like you, and is so well done that it is not possible to bebetter!" (A. Baschet, Aldo Manuzio, [Venice, t86/, pp.7o-Z).

GUSNASCO AND MIGLTOROTTT a9

A letter of Gusnasco to Isabella in April1515, preserved in the Gonzaga ar-chives, reports the shipping of musical instruments to the marchesa, especially "diliuti, viole, corone, buccettine, teste di morto ed altri soggetti di ebano e di avorio,oltre un bellissimo gravicembalo" (of lutes, viols, crowns, little horns, skulls andother objects made out of ebony and ivory, and in addition a most beautifulharpsichord).6 We do not know whether these instruments were made by Gusnascoor only procured for the marchesa. In any case it is significant that keyboard instru-ments were ordered from Venice. Graaicembalo does not mean a heavy or especiallylarge harpsichord. The word is rather equivalent, according to the usage of the time,to claaicembalo, that is, "harpsichord."

The date of Gusnasco's death is not known. Carlo dell'Acqua suggested a577,7

but later years have been mentioned by other writers. As late as L539 the famousorientalist Theseo Ambrogio Albonesi in his Introductio in chaldaicam linguam,

syriacam atque armenicam et decem alias linguas (Pavia, t8ca), p. a83, addresses Gus-nasco as follows:

And what should I say of you, Lorenzo Gusnasco? Who in the field of artistic woodworkhave invented what to few if any people [artists] was given. For how could I overlook thatyou have made an organ of such musical capacity that no musician could have inventedanything so clever and beautiful.s

Today Gusnasco is forgotten. Hardly any dictionary of music or art mentionshis name and importance as a creative artist. Were it not for the indefatigable archivesearches by Alessandro Luzio and Rodolfo Renier, who studied Lombard archives,

and for historians such as Julia Cartwrighte and Jan Lauts,lo we would know verylittle about him.

But there may be a living testimony to the subtle artistry of Gusnasco and evento his mastery of creating instruments of noble, silvery sound.

In:,967, by incredibly good luck, I found in New York, of all places, an Italianspinettina (iltus. 3.r) so beautiful, so subtly ornamented, and so perfectly preservedthat I bought it immediately for the Metropolitan Museum of Art as the curator of itsmusical instrument collection.

The elegant decoration is carefully planned and executed in different media:intarsia, painting, certosina work, carving, and so on, each applied to a different andprecisely limited area. The sound-hole rose, that place par excellence for exquisiteornamentation, is made of several layers of parchment in flamboyant Gothic tracery(illus. 3.2). The wall above the keyboard is divided into nine squares of alternatingdecoration: four squares have a simple geometric design executed in inlay of

5. Quoted in Antonio Bertolottt, Artisti in relazione coi Gonzaga Signori di Mantoaa (Modena, t855),p. ro8.

7. "Lorenzo Gusnasco e i Lingiardi da Pavia," extract from Perseoeranza (Milan, t886).

8. Et de te, Laurenti Gusnache qui dicam? Qui in lignario artificio quod paucis aut forsitan nullisantehac datum fuit, invenisti. Nam ut omittam, quod ligneum quodcumque voluisti musicae facultatisorganum ita adfabre fecisti, ut nihil concinuis musici omnes inveniri posse haberentur."

9. lsabella d'Este, Marchioness of Mantua, 1474-1539 (London, r9o3), vols. r-z; Beatrice d'Este,

Duchess of Milan, I47S-1497 (London, r9z8).rc. lsabella d'Este (Hamburg: Marion V. Schroder, r95z).

J.1. Spinettina made for the Duchess ofUrbino, r54o. Venice. MetropolitanMuseum of Art, 53.6. Pulitzer Be-quest Fund, 1953.

3.3. Intarsia decoration in double syrn-metry; detail of spinettina (illus. 3.r)

3.2. Sound-hole rose of spinettina in illus. 3.r

3.4. Detail of spinettina (illus. 3.r) show-ing several styles of decoration:sculpture, various forms of intarsia,and certosina work with stars ingothic tracery.

GUSNASCO AND MIGLIOROTTI

mother-of-pearl; the remaining five squares show elaborate stars also done inGothic tracery. Even the jackrail is subtly decorated; it is made of gumwood withinlaid strips of walnut and ebony and buttons of black and white segments of ebonyand ivory.

The stylistically most revealing decorations are the intarsia panels at the leftand right of the projecting keyboard; they show slightly different patterns withstylized dolphins and plant forms. Both patterns are designed in double symmetry,left-right as well as top-bottom (illus. 3.3). Any modern psychologist will be re-minded of the Rorschach inkblot test figures in which bilateral symmetry is automat-ically produced by folding a paper with the inkblot still wet; but the spinettina isimmeasurably more sophisticated. 1 1

A strip of wood over the keyboard has a motto painted in large gold letters on ablue ground (illus. 3.4):

Riccho son d'oro-et riccho son di suonoNon mi sonar si tu non ha del buono.

I am rich in gold and rich in sound,O play me not, if no good tune is found.

But the wooden strip is removable, being attached to the instrument by three smallpegs. Its back harbors a surprise. There is a long inscription in ink, in Italian chan-cery of the time: "Ordinata e Fatta per Sua Eccelenza la Sig.ra Duchesa D'UrbinoL'anno di Nostra salute a54o e pagata z5o Scudi Romani [Commissioned by andmade for Her Excellency, the [Lady] Duchess of Urbino in the year of our Redemp-tion r54o and paid for with z5o Roman scudil.,,

This information is more than we usually glean from old keyboard instrumentsbut unfortunately the name of the maker is not mentioned. This is an exceptionallybeautiful instrument, and the price mentioned was a large one at the time of manu-facture. As we know, Venice then had a substantial number of good instrumentmakers, but there is no instrument extant that would give us a clue or a basis forcomparing shape and decoration.

The outstanding workmanship, tone, shape, and decoration suggest a supremecraftsman, and it may not be farfetched to credit Gusnasco or his artistic traditionwith this instrument. As mentioned above, we do not know the exact date of hisdeath, but it is reasonable to assume that even after his death his admired Venetianworkshop continued to flourish for a while. No better memorial could be imaginedfor the subtle craftsmanship of Lorenzo da Pavia than this Venetian spinettina"made of golden sound."

rr. See Emanuel Wintemitz, "A Spinettina for the Duchess of Urbino," Metropolitan Museumlournal r (:768): tot ff.

GUSNASCO AND MIGLIOROTTI

MIGLIOROTTI

Of Atalante Migliorotti's life only a few facts are known, but they are so significantthat they contribute greatly to our knowledge of Leonardo's musical life. Migliorotti,the only musical disciple of Leonardo of whom we know, learned from him inFlorence the art of improvisation on the lira da braccio. The date of his birth has beengiven as 1466.12 According to the earliest musical reference to Leonardo, the Codicedel Anonimo Gaddiano, written between r5o5 and 7.532, "Leortardo fu raro sonatoredi lira et fu maestro di quella d'Atalante Migliorotti [Leonardo was an outstandingperformer of the lira da braccio and a teacher of Atalante Migliorotti in this artf ."According to the same source, Atalante was with Leonardo when Lorenzo Mug-nifico sent Leonardo to Lodovico il Moro in Milan inr481to present to the duke a lirada braccio, in whose mastery he was unique ("a presentarli insieme con AtalanteMigliorotti una lira, che unico era in sonare tale exstrum€nto").ra

Migliorotti's name is linked with a famous performance of Poliziano's Fauola

d'Orfeo at the court of Mantua. According to various contradictory sources the firstperformance of this celebrated pastoral in Mantua has been dated t4V, t472, andr48o. The role of Orfeo at the first performance was sung by the celebrated impro-viser Baccio Ugolino. The second performance took place in r49r with Atalante as

protagonist, a sure testimony to his fame as improviser on the lira da braccio.Poliziano's text shows clearly that the whole Faoola was permeated by music. The

obvious interest of Leonardo in Poliziano's Orfeo as a musical drama, and Migliorot-ti's performance will be discussed in chapter 6.

For the year 1.5a3 and the following three years Migliorotti worked as an inspec-

tor of constructions ("soprastante alle fabbriche") for Pope Leo. Leonardo was re-

peatedly in Rome between r5r3 and r5r5. The last (existing) information aboutAtalante mentions him as an architect.la

This meager evidence gives a rather incoherent picture of Atalante's life but is

still colorful enough for us to imagine him as an interesting and versatile musician,echoing the magic personality of Leonardo.

rz. In Gaetano Milanesi, Documenti inediti risguardanti Lionardo da Vinci (Florence, r87z).r3. The word lira was constantly mistaken and erroneously translated in the literature on

Leonardo and the object was usually considered a plucked, not a bowed, instrument, until my articles"Lira da braccio," in Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenutart 8 (r95o): %5-54, and "Engelskonzert," inDie Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwarf 15 (suppI.) (r97):8935.

r4. See Milanesi, Documenti inediti.

PART II

THE PERFORMER

Improviser, teacher of music,organtzer of stage plays and entertainments

CHAPTER FOUR

The Lira da Rraccio

As mentioned above, Leonardo's instrument for his improvisations was, accordingto Vasari, the lira. There is no doubt that the word lira meantthe lira da braccio. Trueenough, for a long time the Italians used the word lira for two instruments, theancient Greek lyre and the bowed Renaissance instrument equipped with stoppablegut strings and additional open strings that ran outside the fingerboard and'couldnot be stopped.

In fact the lira da braccio was one of the most important stringed instruments ofthe Italian Renaissance, the instrument used by the performe"rs to improvise apohphonic accomPaniment to their own recitation. Ai such, the lira da bracciobecame one of the characteristic tools for the intended revival of the ancient traditionof rhapsodes. The use of the lira da braccio remained limited to Italy with very fewexceptions, all of which involved late and larger forms of the instrument.

The instrument in its fully developed form had a flat body, rounded shoulders,and a unique arrangement of strings different from the contemporary viola dagamba, which had a deep body and sloping shoulders. In additio., to firr" melodystrings that could be stopped against the fingerboard, the lira da braccio had two"open strings" (often mistakenly called "drones" or ,,bourdons,,) that ran freelythrough the air outside the fingerboard toward the head, to which they were at-tached by a little protruding wooden stick; they could sound only their fuil length orone tone when touched by the bow or plucked by the player's fingers. It was ;u-st tneexistence of these open strings that reminded the musiciurm oi the High i{enais-sance, devoted to the revival of classical antiquity in many fields includin! music, ofthe ancient lira and kithara. As late as r58r Vincenzo Galilei, the fatheiof GalileoGalilei, in his Dialogo della musica antica e della moderna, tried to establish an order inthis and other terminological confusions and suggested, justifiably, calling the lyreof the Greeks "lira antiqua" and the improvisation instrument of the Renaissance"lira moderrta."

For a long time the lira da braccio was also called "viola." In the second half ofthe sixteenth century the usage still varied: Vasari, for example, speaks of the lira dabraccio played by one of the angels in Carpaccio's Presenlation-in the Temple (Ac-

25

4.1 Lira da b'raccio bv Giovannid'Andrea, \'enice, r5t.

4.2 Orpheus in Hndes, after a bronzeplaque by Moderno.

THE LIRA DA BRACCIO

cademia, venice) as "una lira owero viola" but calls the same instrument, in FraBartolomm eo's sacrt conoersazione for San Marco in Florence, simply a "lita.,, Galilei,in his Dialogo, maintains that only recently had the viola da braccio been called"lira," and, in another passage, that it had been called "lita,,only in his own time("modernamente"). The fact that earlier sources generally refer to the lira da braccioby the name "viola" is not without importance in view of the many musicians withthe nickname "della viola." As we know, during the reign of Alfonso II the court ofFerrara employed Francesco di Viola, a pupil of Willaert, as chapelmaster, and alsothe madrigal composer Alfonso della Viola. Further evidence for the use of the name"viola" for the lira can be seen in the terminology of the period, which frequentlyuses "viols with frets" when referring to members of the viol family, obviously todistinguish them from the fretless lira da braccio. Thus, Ganassi's Regola Rubertinaspeaks expressly of the "viola d'arco tastada" in the title of its first part and of the"violone d'arco da tasti" in its second part, while Lanfranco's Scintille mentions"violoni da tasti & da Arco."

The most characteristic part of the lira da braccio is its head, sometimes an'ooden board shaped like a leaf or a heart, but sometimes in more richly decoratedspecimens a rvhole box with a cover on its rear. Whatever the shape of the head, themethod of attaching the strings is the same: the seven pegs are inserted from thefront rather than from the side as in viols or in the later violins; and the strings arefastened to the small ends of the pegs, which protrude from the rear of the pegboardor from inside the pegbox. In order to be fastened this way, the five melody stringsare made to pass from the nut through little holes to the back of the pegboard.

Only very few specimens are preserved from Leonardo's time in their originalstate. The oldest and at the same time the most beautiful specimen is the lira dabraccio made in Verona in r5rr by Giovanni d'Andrea (illus. 4.r). It is today one of themost valuable possessions of the collection of musical instruments in the Kunsthis-torisches Museum, Vienna. The fingerboard and the string holder are decorated intypical North Italian style, alla certosina, that is, by a colorful combination of ebony,ivory, bone that has been stained green, and brown wood. The most striking fea-ture, however, is the carving of belly and back, which give the impression of humanforms. The belly is shaped like a male torso and, correspondingly, the front of thepegbox shows a grotesque male face. The back shows, in stronger relief, the form ofa female torso, with breasts and nipples strongly marked, and, accordingly, the backof the pegbox shows a woman's face. But this is not the end of the sculptural fantasy:acanthus leaves encroach upon the female torso, and on its middle region is a largemoustachioed mascherone that overlays the curves of the female form. The soundholes in the belly are unusually large and of tendril shape. The pegbox can be closed,and it is remarkable how cleverly the pegs are inserted so as to disturb as little aspossible the grimace of the grotesque face. A little ivory plaque inserted into the backbears the somewhat misspelled Greek inscription,

AYIIH>IATPO> E>TINAN@PQIIOD OAH

27

28 THE LIRA DA BRACCIo

actually an ancient monostichon: "Men have song as the physician of pain," thuspaying respect to humanist learning, so important in the North Italian culture of thetime.

How far this masterpiece of applied ornamental sculpture is from the stan-dardized forms of string instruments of later ages! And how much it helps us tovisualize other bizarce and fantastic musical instruments such as the lira da bracciothat Leonardo built in the shape of a horse skull.

Because so few instruments have been preserved, pictorial sources are indis-pensable. The number of contemporary depictions of the lira da braccio is enor-mous, especially in Venetian, Lombard, and Tuscan art (frescoes, paintings oncanvas and wood, woodcuts and engravings, sculpfures, reliefs and plaquettes,wood intarsias, book vignettes, decorations of frames, and so forth). The greaterpart of these pictorial representations occurs in mythological and allegorical scenesand in angel concerts. Apollo and Orpheus, as a rule, play the lira da braccio, Apolloin his combat with Marsyas or Pan (the earliest example probably being the woodcutillustration in the Ooidio MetamorphoseosVolgare [Venice, r5or]) or as the leader of theMuses (the most famous representation in Raphael's fresco of the Parnassus in theStanza della Segnatura in the Vatican, innumerable times copied and varied). Or-pheus appears as a musician teaching the beasts (for instance, in the engraving byBenedetto Montagna); as the victor over the demons of hell (in Signorelli's frescocycle in the Chapel of St. Bnzio in the dome of Orvieto; in a bronze plaque byModerno [illus. 4.2); andinPeruzzi' s frieze in the Villa Farnesina in Rome); or as theguide of Euridice (in Marcantonio Raimondi's engraving). Similarly Homer and theroyal psalmist David are represented with the lira da braccio.

Thus it is characteristically the famous improvisers of the ancient world andthe Old Testament who accompany their songs with the lira da braccio. In the angelconcerts of the Renaissance, the lira da braccio appears either in the large ensemblesof the Coronation of the Virgin or in small angel groups, usually two or three,sometimes only one, in front of the throne of the Madonna in the sacre conaersazioni,chiefly in Venetian painting. Portraits of musicians with the lira da braccio are rare.An early one attributed to Raffaellino del Garbo is in the National Gallery, Dublin.The most reliable representations are in the nearly life-size Venetian altarpieces ofthe Enthroned Virgin, in the numerous still lifes, neglected alike by art historiansand music historians, in wood intarsias such as those in the ducal palaces of Urbino,Gubbio, and Mantua, in the choir stalls in Monte Oliveto, Verona, and in otherplaces. Very often in pictures and reliefs there are richly decorated lire da braccio, as

in Cima da Conegliano's tondo with the contest between Apollo and Pan in theUffizi; in the Sforza Book of Hours with the Madonna and two angels playinginstruments; in the Enthroned Virgin by Gaudenzio Ferrari in the Pinacoteca, Turin;and in many others. The borderline between the fantasy of the painter and the loveof the builder for fanciful decoration is not easy to draw, especially since the buildingof instruments was by no means standardized, often because of the application ofthe vocabulary of ornaments from classical antiquity to the instruments.

4.3. Lira da braccio in wood intarsia.Choir stall in Santa Maria inOrgano, Venice.

Giovanni Bellini, detail from altar-piece. San Zaccaia, Venice.

4.4

)o THE LIRA DA BRACCIO

THE BOW

Because no bow has been preserved that can be accepted with certainty as a bow for alira da braccio, we have to rely on pictorial sources. The length of the bow is sodifferent in the pictorial representations that one can hardly establish a norm. TheNorth Italian lira da braccio of Leonardo's time in Milan usually had a very long bow,often longer than sound box and neck together (illus. 4.3and 4.4). Here we can drawreliable conclusions because the altarpieces (the Venetian ones by Montagna, Car-paccio, Giovanni Bellini, and farther south, by Perugino and Raphael) excel inperspective precision, and the instruments represented at the same time in woodintarsias are usually nearly life-size. Extremely long bows are found in The Assump-tion of the Virgin by Fra Antonio da Bologna in Monte Oliveto, in the reliefs of theOrpheus mythby the PaduanAndrea Riccio, and in the extremely precise engravingof Orpheus by Benedetto Montagna (illus. 4.5). Surprisingly short bows, even allow-ing for strong perspectival foreshortening, appear in the rendering of the angelplaying a lira da braccio painted to flank Leonardo's Madonna of the Rocks, by Am-brogio de Predis, and in Carpaccio's The Presentation in the Temple, today in theAccademia, Venice (illus. 4.6).

SOCIAL STATUS AND USE BY VIRTUOSI

The musical treatises of the Renaissance that mention the lira da braccio are moreconcerned with technical problems, such as its accordatura, than with its centralplace in Renaissance culture, which is taken for granted. But occasional hints innonmusical writings provide a sufficiently clear picture. In his discussions ofLeonardo's musical interests Vasari emphasizes Leonardo's preference for the lirada braccio as that of a man who by nature had a high-flowing spirit, full of graceful-ness, and who sang divinely, as an improviser, over its accompaniment.l Castig-lione in the second book of his Cortegiano distinguishes among several forms ofperformance: "Beautiful music seems to be singing precisely and with good tastefrom the score, but much more even the singing to the viola."2 Here he means thelira da braccio, which we find depicted in various rooms of the ducal palace ofUrbino, whose social gatherings he so vividly described (illus. 4.7).

Baccio Ugolino, the famous protagonist in the first performance of Poliziano'sOrfeo in Mantua, who was rewarded for his musicianship with the Bishop's See ofGadta, earned the applause of Lorenzo de Medici through his singing "adlyram."From this and many other passages appears the importance of the lira da braccio as

the instrument of virtuosi and also of dilettantes. Masters of the lira da braccioperformed regularly at the courts of Ferrara and Milan. According to Vasari, whom

t. ". . . che della natura aveva spirito elevatissimo a pieno di leggiadria, onde sopra quella cantodivinamente all'improwiso." (Vite, ed. Milanesi, vol. 4, p. r8).

z. "Bella musica. . . parmi il cantar bene a libro sicuramente, et con bella maniera: ma anchormolto pii il cantare alla viola."

4.5. Benedetto Montagna, Orpheus. En-graving, Metropolitan Museum of Arlcollection of photographs.

4.6. Vittore Carpaccio, Presentation in theTemple, detail. Accademia, Venice.

32 THE LIRA DA BRACCIO

4.7. Intarsia of lute and lira da braccio. Studiolo, Palazzo ducale, Urbino

we quoted on p. xxiii, Leonardo was introduced to the court of Milan in r4g4 and

presented to the duke, who was himself a player of the lira. As a rule, rePorts speak

of "cantare Sopra" or "Su lalira." This corresponds Precisely to the oPinion of the

musical archaeologists of the Renaissance about the practice in antiquity. Zatlino,for instance, devoted a whole chapter in the fifth book of his lstitutioni to the

ancient poets and rhapsodes and their recitation to the "lira" artd"cetra'"The use of the lira da braccio without singing or recitation occurs chiefly in the

pictures of angel concerts. There our instrument appears within larger instrumental

grorpr but always as the only representative of its kind. Often it is combined withthe lute and the rebec, occasionally also with recorder or cromorne. But it also

appears as the only instrument in the painting, for instance, in the saua contsersazione

of Palma Vecchio inS. Zaccaria in Venice (illus. 4.8), where one angel, sitting alone

in front of the throne of the Madonna and between the flanking grouPs of saints,

plays the lira da braccio. Nothing could be more eloquent testimony to the elevated

rank of this instrument. In the sacra conaersazioni, so prominent a subject in Venetian

painting, the conversation between the saints flanking the Madonna and Child is a

silent meditation. No human voice is to break the stillness-only the unearthly

sound of the lira da braccio.

4.8. Palma Vecchio, Sacra conoersazione. SanZaccaia, Venice.

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THE LIRA DA BRACCIO

MYTHOLOGY AND ALLEGORIES

As no other instrument of the Italian Renaissance the lira da braccio is intimatelyconnected with the tendency to revive ancient traditions and, above all, ancientmusical practice. Its name and presumed origin in antiquity, the number (seven) ofits strings corresponding to the ancient lyre, the use of some open strings, and lastbut not least, its actual importance as an improvisation instrument in the hands ofRenaissance improvisers accompanying themselves-all these facts have given it anallegorical significance that is reflected in the visual arts and in the allegorical andemblematic literature of the time. Already in the quattrocento it appears as thesymbolic attribute of the great mythological poets and musicians of antiquity and ofthe Old Testament. In numerous paintings and sculptures it is depicted in the handsof improvisers and rhapsodes of the remote or mythical past: Apollo, orpheus,Homer, and King David.

Also in the allegorical representations of the liberal arts, the lira da braccio isoften depicted as a symbol of music, as in Pinturicchio's fresco in the appartimentiBorgia of the Vatican and in the bronze funeral monument for Sixtus IV by Pollaiuolo(illus. +.9).In countless renderings of the contest of Apollo with Marsyas and withPan, Apollo usually plays the lira da braccio as a symbol of the noble "mathematical"music of strings, as distinguished from the guttural and rustic sound of the variousreed instruments in the hands of his musical rivals,3 the first probably being thefamous woodcuts in the first edition of the Oaidio Metamorphoseos aolgare (Venice,r5or) (illus. 4.ro). Later examples are found in paintings by Schiavone and in the

4.ro. Contest between Apollo and Pan. Woodcut from Oaidio metamorphoseos zsolgare, ryo4 fol. r43 r.

3. See Emanuel Winternitz, "The Curse of Pallas Athena," in Musical lnstruments and TheirSymbolism in Western Art, zd ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979).

35

)6 THE LIRA DA BRACC IO

painting decorating a harpsichord lid in the Hermitage, attributed to Schiavone andto Correggio.a

In miniatures and woodcuts of the later quattrocento the royal psalmist Davidbegan to replace his harp or psaltery with the lira da braccio. Paintings and prints ofthe fifteenth century show him consistently with the lira da braccio (illus. 4.rr).

Often the number of strings is interpreted as symbolic: the number sevenalluding to the seven planets, as by Zarlino in his lstitutioni Harmoniche and inLanfranco's Scintille di Musica. Nine strings are used in the lira da braccio played byApollo in Raphael's fresco of the Parnassus in the Segnatura in the Vatican. This isapparently an allusion to the nine Muses, whose leader Apollo is; we may think also

of the nine modes of the Greeks, mentioned by Gaudentios after 2oo A.D. and inLeonardo's time by Zarlino.

Finally, as a symbol or an attribute of humanists, the lira da braccio appears innumerous book illustrations and frontispieces. The Plutarch edition (Ferrara, r5or)

shows a poet or philosopher with a laurel wreath, absorbed in his writing, a lira da

4.rr. King David with a large lira dabraccio (lirone), 1497.

4. As for the allegorical importance of the lira da braccio in Giovanni Bellini's famous Feast of the

Gods in the National Gallery, Washington, see Emanuel Winternitz, "A Lira da Braccio in GiovanniBellini's 'Feast of the Gods,'" Art Bulletin z8 (t946).

4.42. Laureate poet with lira da braccioand bow. From Epithome Plutarchi,1501.

4.14. Lute player, with lira da braccio inbackground. Title page of Lorenzode' Medici, Selae d'amore.

4.r3. Humanist with lira da braccio.

4.15. Lira da braccio player improvising.

38 THE LIRA DA BRACCIo

braccio and bow suspended from a branch of a tree (illus. 4.rz). Notwithstanding thesmall dimensions of the print, the strings and pegs are marked with the greatestprecision. The treatise De Syllabarum quantitate of Quintianus Stoa (Pavia, r5rr) in-cludes a laurel-crowned humanist writing at his desk, flanked by his lira da braccioand bow (illus. 4.r3), the strongly curved bow substantially longer than the instru-ment. Two instruments for improvisation are available to the musician in the fron-tispiece of the Selae d'amore by Lorenzo de' Medici, the lute and the lira da bracciowith its bow (illus. 4.r4). Ananonymous woodcut of Leonardo's time shows a recitalby a young improviser (illus. 4.15).

The fashion of the lira da braccio as an improvisation instrument declinedduring the second half of the sixteenth century. It was succeeded by the rise of theviolin, which inherited several characteristics of the lira da braccio, such as theelegantly curved profile, some peculiarities of tuning, and the absence of frets. Anoddly late illustration of the lira da braccio appears in a German musical treatise, thefamous Syntagma Musicum by Michael Praetorius, especially in its supplement ofillustrations, the Theatrum Instrumentorum, published after the beginning of theThirty Years' War in Germany. While all woodcuts showing instruments are ofunsurPassed exactness, the picture of the lira da braccio is inaccurate. Evidently thedraftsman did not have a specimen at hand.

It was in l.892, after a long period of oblivion, that the musical world in Ger-many was reminded of the lira da braccio by the first publication devoted exclusivelyto the description and importance of this instrument. This book appeared in thesouthernmost corner of the Austrian monarchy, in the Balkans. It was written by aningenious musical amateur, Alexander Hajdecki: Die italienische Lira da Braccio. Einekunst-historische Studie zur Geschichte der Violine (Mostar (Herzogovina), r89z). Haj-decki was a major in the Austrian army stationed in Bosnia and evidently wasinspired by his knowledge of Balkan instruments, especially the use of drone andother open strings in the folk instruments there.s

5. See the bibliography on the lira da braccio in my article on this instrument in Die Musik inGeschichte und Gegenwarf 8 (196o): %5-54.

CHAPTER FIVE

The Nlystery of the Skwll Lyre

We have mentioned at the beginning of this book (p. xxiii) Vasari's enthusiastic reportof Leonardo's arrival in Milan to improvise, that is, to sing with his own accompani-ment on the "lyte," and how he with this performance was found to excel all theother musicians at the court. The instrument itself is simply described as a"lyra,made largely of silver, in the shape of a horse skull," certainly an unusual, bizarueinstrument which could not fail to astonish the Duke and the courtiers.

A reconstruction of this silver lyre requires familiarity with substantial facts oftechnical and artistic importance in the culture of which Leonardo was a part, amongthem the fantastic as an element in Renaissance art in general. Leonardo had a

penchant for fantastic shapes, from machines to magic tricks, and gave rein to thispenchant during his employment at the Milanese court, where he served as anentertainer and organizer of spectacles, feasts, and other amusements. Not fantas-tic, but related to pictorial allegories and symbolism, was the Renaissance traditionof using human and animal skulls and bones as subjects of aesthetic appreciationand meditation. Leonardo is well known as a master in drawing skulls, apparentlybeing attracted by their structure and complex curvature of surface with its interplayof light and shadow. His extensive anatomical research included studies in compara-tive anatomf , for example, the legs of different animals. He made a great number ofsketches of the anatomy of the horse, including proportion studies of horse heads as

a preparation for the gigantic equestrian monument planned for the court of theCastello in Milan.

Another strand in the artistic traditions leading toward Leonardo's silver lyreis the status and nature of musical performance and the unparalleled inventivefreedom and individuality of the great instrument builders, who often were paint-ers, sculptors, and musicians at the same time. Their use of shange shapes anddecorations often seems confused or blurred in retrospect if we are not familiar withtheir esteem-sometimes archaeologically sound, sometimes naive or mistaken-for the ancient classical Greek lyre. They frequently identified the Renaissance lirada braccio, a bowed fiddle with some stopped and some open strings, with whatthey knew of the ancient lyre of the Greeks. Only against this complex background

)9

40 THE MYSTERY OF THE SKULL LYRE

of heterogeneous aesthetic elements, visual and musical traditions, fashions, andstylistic tendencies can a fantastic tool such as Leonardo's horse-skull lyre be envis-aged. We will try to do this by analyzing a number of examples from the visual arts,particularly because they bear more precise and reliable testimony than verbal ex-planations.

We may begin with one drawing by Leonardo himself . In Leonardo's notebookis a curious page (Paris, Bibliothdque Nationale MS zqTBib. Nat. C r)1 showing onone half some Italian folk instruments, on the other half a bizarre composite ofanimal parts (illus. 5.r). Here Leonardo, for fun or to let his playful pen move freely,drew a bizarre goat skull or, rather, a composite of elements of goat anatomy and abird beak with hair or remnants of feathers. But it is clearly a musical instrument.Three strings are fastened to the teeth at one end and to the upper projections of thejaw at the other end. The strings are not drawn with a ruler, but n,ith a free yetmiraculously sure hand; if the eye focuses closely on either end of the strings, theyaPPear tremulous, as if they still preserved some vibration. To strengthen the illu-sion of a musical instrument, a great number of slightly curved frets are drawn underthe strings.

This bizarre string instrument is only one burlesque form of the amusingcomposite contraptions, exceeding or improving nature, which abounded inLeonardo's fertile imagination. In his Trattato della Pittura (TPz7 and TP3r) he statesexplicitly that "painting deals with forms that can be found and such that cannot befound in nature" and that "nature is full of innumerable principles that were nottranslated into actual reality." In fact his unceasing observation of nature and hisexperiments showed Leonardo how to supplement nature with free imitations andeven to improve on it by new inventions adapted to its principles.2

The "improvement" of nature by combining parts of various animals intomonsters must have started in Leonardo's early years in Florence. If we can believeVasari, Leonardo invented such a monster as the fitting background for a painting ofhis showing the head of Medusa. Vasari reports in his Vite that "Leonardo tooklizards, newts, maggots, snakes, butterflies, locusts, bats, and other animals of thatkind, out of which he composed a horrible and terrible monster of poisonous breath,issuing from a dark and broken rock, belching poison from its open throat, fire fromits eyes, and smoke from its nostrils, of truly terrible and horrible aspect."

In greatest possible contrast to these monsters are Leonardo's studies of ani-mals based on exact observations of nafure, such as his proportion studies of horsesand especially horse heads.

r. One of the many Leonardo notebooks, including the Codice Atlantico of the Ambrosiana,seized by Napoleon in the course of his Italian campaign and shipped to Paris, the intellectual center ofthe modern world. At the Vienna Congress of r8r5 Canova was appointed by an art commission tosupervise the restitution, but a number of Leonardo's notebooks, including Bib. Nat. 2037, wereforgotten and have remained in Paris until this day.

z. See chap. tt on musical instruments (the glissando flutes and the new key system for windinstruments) and my essay "Anatomy the Teacher," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 3,no. 4 (Aug.) ry57: 234-37. V. P. Zubov, Leonardo da Vinci (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,

ry68) , pp . 254 ff . , in his perceptive chapter on homo faber mentlons some sources of these notions ofLeonardo, above all Pliny's Natural History published in Italian translation (Yenice, 1476).

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The noble form of the horse was doubly dignified for its beauty and as a statussymbol for the nobleman (caaaliere). It goes without saying that Leonardo, as ahorseman, draftsman, painter, sculptor, anatomist, and physiologist, was in-terested in the configuration and proportions of horses all his life.

what a hunting ground Florence and, later, Milan must have been forLeonardo when he was engaged in his grandiose project for the equestrian monu-ment for Francesco Sforza. Of course he must have made comparisons amonghorses of different physiognomies, such as the classical horses of San Marco inVenice, the calm and dignified horse of the Gattamelata, and the porverful, agitated,high-stepping, almost dancing horse of the colleoni. He must have been happy toexamine the gait and temperament of living horses, Turkish, Arabian, Spanish,Sicilian, and Florentine, in the various stables.3 The Sforza court u,as famous for thevariety and quality of its horses. In Leonardo's years there, the most celebratedgiostra (tournament) was held on January 26, r49r, in the palace of Galeazzo daSanseverino.aln Cr5v, Leonardo mentions that "onthis day he went to ihe house ofMesser Galeazzo da Sanseverino to arrange the pageant for his tournament." InWindsor 72294 he refers to "the Sicilian of Messer Galeazzo"; in Windsor rz3r9 to"the big jennet" ("giannetto grosso"-swift horse of North African or Hispanicbreed); in Forster III 88 r, Leonardo notes the locations of the stables of other horsesexceptional for their necks or heads or haunches, or for their size. Leonardo's proj-ects for large stables are found in CA 96 va and B 39 r.

Which of his many extant sketches of horses, especially of horse heads, can berelated to the creation of his silver lyre in the shape of a horse skull?

There were three great works of Leonardo in which the studv of the horse wasessential: the Adoration of the Magi, the Anghiari Battle, and the equestrian monu-ment for Francesco Sforza.

The Adoration of the Magi kept Leonardo occupied during the years t48o-82,and studies of horse heads have been reliably dated in those years.

The studies of the Anghiari Baf fle must be attributed to the later years U5q-o4) ,that is, after his return to Florence in r5oo, seven years after he had appeared for thefirst time in Milan with his silver lyre and created great attention by his improvisa-tions.

More complex is the chronology of Leonardo's occupation with the grandioseplan for the colossal equestrian monument for Francesco Sforza, the father ofGaleazzo Maria and Lodovico il Moro. s A large number of sketches can be attributedto this work, especially the many drawings for the technical feat of casting, rediscov-ered only recently in Madrid.

3. On the choice of horses for the equestrian monument, see the remarks by Kenneth Clark,Leonardo da Vinci (New York: Penguin Books, 1958), p. 88.

4. See G. B. de Toni, "Feste e Giostre in Milano ai Tempi di Leonardo," in Per il IV Centenariodella Morte di Leonardo da Vinci (Bergamo, ryt9), p. ro9.

5. For the history of the equestrian monument for Frencesco Sforza, see especially the chapter"I1 Cavallo" by Maria Vittoria Brugnoli in The Llnknown Leonardo (New York: McGraw-Hill , ag74), pp.8o-ro8.

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44 THE MYsTERY oF THE SKULL LYRE

But the project for the big horse goes back much earlier to Leonardo's years inFlorence, when he was still connected with Verrocchio and probably when Verroc-chio worked on his Colleoni monument for Venice. There is some evidence thatGaleazzo Maria decided as early as1473 to erect a bronze equestrian monument tohis father, who had died in 1466, andto look in Florence, Rome, and elsewhere for amaster who could do it.6

The famous draft of Leonardo's letter offering his sen ices to the Duke ofMilan, Lodovico Sforza, is from 1482. It includes nine detailed paragraphs describingLeonardo's experience in architecture, machinery, and offensive and defensiveweaPons for sea and land war; then Leonardo mentions brieflr' architecture inpeacetime and guiding water from one place to another; then sculpture and paintingare briefly referred to: "I can carry out sculpture in marble, bronze, or clar', and also Ican do any painting, whatever may be done, as well as any other, be he who hemay." Finally-and this is significant-he proceeds to extol with fanfare one specificproject: "Again the bronze horse may be taken in hand, which is to be to theimmortal glory and eternal honor of the prince, your father of happv memory and ofthe illustrious house of Sforza." It is hard to resist the assumption that the silverlyre in the shape of a horse skull, brought by Leonardo to the Duke of Milan,according to Vasari's report, was taken there by Leonardo to remind his futurepatron of how familiar he was with horse anatomy.

On this basis, then, we have to examine two groups of horse-head studies,those related to the Adoration of the Magi and those possibly related to the FrancescoSforza monument, with an eye to similarifies with some contemporary forms of thelira da braccio.

As early as r48r a great number of animated horses appear in the middleground and background of Leonardo's Adoration of the Magi, one of them near theleft border in strict frontal aspect (illus. 5.2). Perhaps related to it may be a sketch ofthe head of a horse, also in strictly frontal view, windsor rzz85 (illus . 53).? Anothersketch, Windsor tzz86, includes also proportion studies of a horse head in profileand in frontal view, with proportion marks (itlus. 5.4);8 this is similar to ez85 but isprobably later. A few lines of text near the drawing relate the proportion marks andnumbers to each other.

A sketch in the Institute de France (illus. 5.5) (A 6z v) shows again a horse headin profile and in frontal view, with proportion lines and letters added. On top of thepage Leonardo's explanation points out that the distance from one ear to the othercorresponds to the length of the ear, and that the ear should be one-fourth the lengthof the whole face.

6. [n493 the model for the casting had progressed so far that it could be celebrated by theMilanese court Poets as a miracle of art. See Waldemar von Seidlitz, Leonardo da Vircl (Vienna: Phaidon,a%), pp.r3o, r3r, 46o.

7. These studies are associated by Kenneth Clark with the Adoration of the Kings in the Uffizi,begun in March r48r. A tracing of this drawing is on p. 75, plate 39, of the Codex Huygens, PierpontMorgan Library Codex MArl?1g, published by Erwin Panofsky, The Codex Huygens and Leonardo's ArtTheory (London, r94o), p. 55, fig. 39.

8. This drawing is also freely copied on the same page of the Codex Huygens quoted above.

5.3. Horse heads in front view and pro-file. Windsor rzz85.

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5.4. Horse head in front and profileviews, with proportion numbers.Windsor rzz86.

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5.5. Horse head in front and profileviews. Institut de France, A 6z v

5.6. Detail from Verrocchio's Colleoni monument, Venice.

THE MYSTERY OF THE SKULL LYRE

Here we must at least mention the probability that Leonardo, long before hisdeparture for Milan in;.483, assisted Verrocchio in some way with the preparationfor the Colleoni horse in Venice. The competition was announced inr479, and in r48ta fuil-sized model in wood was completed to be sent to Venice.e lt is hard to assumethat Leonardo would not have been familiar with it. For our purposes it suffices tonote the almost flat plane descending from the forehead of the horse down to itsnostrils, precisely the space where Leonardo could have stretched the strings overthe front of the horse skull, chosen as the basic form for his silver lira da braccio (illus.

5.6).Trying to discern patterns of historic fascination with the grotesque and fantastic

as reflected in Leonardo's oeuvre, including the beauty of bones and their allegoricalsignificance, we may distinguish: (a) the survival of medieval drolleries, especiallyshowing animals using bones, and jawbones in particular, as musical instruments;(b) grotesque or fantastic elements in the structure, function, and ornamentation ofmusical instruments; and (c) archaeological fantasies with mythological or allegori-cal purpose, such as the Roman bucrania and the military or heraldic shields (scudi)in the stylized shape of horse skulls.

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47

5.7. Page from The Book of Hours of leanned'Eoreut illustrated by Jean Pucelle.Metropolitan Museum of Art, NewYork.

Animal jaws made into musical instruments have a long history in burlesqueand satirical art. "Musical jawbones" abound in drolleries. For instance, in the Booksof Hours of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, composite monsters combining

9. See Grinter Passavant, Verrocchio (London, 1959).

*ee w, .. .........,....-.....,,...d,... .._,.............r


animal and human shapes fill the lacunae where the text leaves part of the line

empty. One of the countless examples is the Hours of leanne d'Eareux, illustrated by

]ean Pucelle, circa 1325, whose illustrations admit a crowd of whimsical and jocular

creatures among which are fantastic compound animals such as lion-reptiles and

snake-goats, drigons with monks' heads, and friars with the hind legs of beasts of

prey. Ifustration 5.7 shows a typical page with comical pictures. A dog watched by

in astonished hare fingers a vertical flute consisting of a bone. A billy goat is dis-

turbed by an aggressive weasel while bowing with human hands a large animal jaw;

as a bow he uses a rake. It is not without irony that profane, if not devilish, creatures

are permitted to invade the sacred text.loGaudenzio Ferrari's magnificent fresco of an angel concert in the flat Lombard

cupola of the Santuario in Saronno contains many instruments of his time (actually a

complete catalogue of existing instruments) but in addition instruments created by

the painter's brush, fantastic but nevertheless acoustically feasible, and also instru-

-".,tr that are grotesque inventions with little basis in reality (illus' 5.8)." Among

the latter is an instrument bowed and blown at the same time (illus. 5.9). The body is

that of an elegant cittem; the strings are not marked, but in the whole fresco no

strings ur" pui.rt"d since the ceiling is too high to have them visible. The bridge is

clearly depicted, and the bow with a grotesque spiral handle strikes the imaginary

strings. The cittern is penetrated by a recorder whose mouthpiece is held between

the angel's lips and itslower end by the left hand, which at the same time opens and

closeslhe finger holes that are, however, too near the lower end of the tube to

achieve anything like a normal scale. But in heaven much is possible, for instance,

the combination of bowing and blowing in one single instrument.Illustration 5.ro shows another of Gaudenzio's grotesque instruments, a com-

bination of two bagpipes, or rather a double bagpipe with one blorvpipe, two chan-

ters, and two dronei-a stunning contraption, grotesque in appearance but not at all

fantastic in the sense of being nonfunctional; there is no violation of functional or

acoustical laws.Another bowed-blown instrument appears in Piero di Cosimo's famous cas-

sone painting of The Liberation of Andromeda in the Ufhzi (illus. 5.rr)' This painting

shows two successive phases of the liberation, with Perseus appearing in both. On

the right he is shown descending from the sky, in precisely the same manneras did

*ur,y1.g"ls and deities on the Renaissance stage with the help of special machines,

of *irictr perhaps the most famous example is Brunelleschi's macchina devised for

the descent of the Archangel Gabriel and eight other angels in the spectacles for the

Festa dell' Annunziata.12In the center of our picture Perseus aPPeaIS again, standing

on the sea monster's shoulders and reaching out to deliver the mortal blow. At the

left Andromeda is fainting, while the crowd averts its glance. At the right, however,

we find the same crowd jubilant over her delivery and, in addition, there are two

ro. SeeEmanuelWinternitz,"BagpipeslortheLord," tnMetropolitanMuseumBulletin,lunerg5S'

rr. God the Father, in the center, w"l.o-", the Blessed Virgin into heaven, which is filled with a

magnificent profusion of angels, dancing, jubilating, praying, singing, and playing instruments'- rz. See Vasari, Vite, ed. Milanesi, vol. z, pp' 375 ff '

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5.4o. Angel blowing a double bagpipe;detail of illus. 5.8.

THE MYSTERY OF THE SKULL LYRE 5L

exotic musicians with strange instruments (illus. 5.rz). The instrument at the left,held by a kneeling youth who tunes it, looks fantastic only insofar as the sound boxgrotesquely imitates a swan or other bird with a long neck but is otherwise com-pletely functional. The other instrument, played by a dark-skinned musician inexotic garb, is much more complex: it has a large sound box, with seven stringsrunning over two bridges. The upper end of the sound box continues in what seemto be two tubes, one short and the other long, bent back to run parallel to the side ofthe sound box. After this bend the tube develops a bulbous extension in the shape ofan animal head. Farther down, we notice five side-holes and then a round bulb likethat of a platerspiel (a simple form of bagpipe well known in the Renaissance;through its bulb the tube receives air from the player's mouth by means of a shortblowpipe). While the left hand of the player plucks the strings, the right hand stopsthe finger holes of the long tube. Curiously, the finger holes are not between theblowpipe and the mouth of the tube; thus the entire wind attachment is functionalnonsense. However, as a combination of string sound with wind sound it is onlyone example of a whole line of such instruments that seem to fulfill an old dream ofmusicians: the one-man orchestra.

This painting is of special significance in the context of this book. There isstrong evidence that Leonardo participated in some way in the creation of Piero'spainting. The inventory of the Uffizi of r58o mentions the painting as drawn byLeonardo and colored by Piero di Cosimo. Vasari, in his life of Piero di Cosimo,states: "Piero used to color in oil, after he had seen certain things shaded ["fiumeg-giate"l and finished with that extreme care which Leonardo used when he wanted todisplay his art. "13 Among modern art historians Suida goes even further; he believesthat Piero's painting was taken completely from a drawing by Leonardo or was evenexecuted with his help. But there is also some indirect evidence: in my article "Musi-cal Instruments for the Stage," I considered the Perseus-Andromeda painting as aforemost example of those paintings which are designs for scenery of planned stageplays, records for posterity of successful scenery, or at least directly inspired by suchscenery.1a There cannot be any doubt that the whole design reflects a stage design:the dragon in the center, the mountains, coulisses left and righf Perseus, repre-sented twice, as he appears in the sky and then standing on the dragon's back; thesame people shown twice, as the frightened and later the jubilant chorus.

That Piero's inventiveness was employed in stage scenery is also attested to byVasari: "In his youth, since he had a capricious and extravagant imagination ["in-venzione"l he was much employed in mascherate." Even his help with music ismentioned there. But there is also another unquestionable trace, never mentionedbefore, of Leonardo's hand itself in the design of the dragon. As Leonardo's count-less anatomical drawings show, he was convinced that the set of shoulder musclescan operate only one set of extremities-arms or wings, but not both, as appears so

13. Ibid., vol. 4, p. r34.14. "Musical lnstruments for the Stage," in Les FAfus de la Renaissance, I (Paris: Editions du Centre

National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1956; reprinted as chap. 16 of Musical lnstruments and TheirSymbolism in Western Arf [Norton and Faber & Faber, t967; zd ed., Yale University Press, 1979)).

5.71. The Liberation of Andromeda by Piero di Cosimo. Uffizi, Florence.

5.12. Detail of illus. 5.rr.

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5.13. Gaudenzio Ferrari, altarpiece. Pinacoteca, Turin.

5.14. Detail from a cassone by Bar-tolommeo di Giovanni. Louvre,Paris.

54 THE MYSTERY oF THE SKULL LYRE

often in the wings of angels. This logic of anatomy, as I would briefly call it, is strictlyobserved by him even for fantastic creatures such as dragons. The present dragonhas two pairs of fins, frontal and rear, instead of front wings and rear legs as in manydrawings of other dragons. Never did he draw dragons such as Raphael did, withwings added to the two pairs of legs.

Grotesque aPPearance is often bestowed upon Renaissance instruments not somuch through their shape but by their ornamentation. In Gaudenzio Ferrari's altar-piece in the Pinacoteca of Turin showing Mury with the Infant, one of the twoaccompanying angels plays a lira da braccio of very long and somewhat eccentricshape (illus. 5.r3). Its front is decorated with an imaginative network of spirals,leaves, and tendrils.ls Some of the tendrils spiral out from the side walls of theinstrument into open space, a device more graceful than practical, if one considershow easily the bowing could be hampered and the angel wings hurt. The vegetalornaments on the soundboard could also be seen by an impressionable eye as theface of a singing or shouting male, the two kidney-shaped sound holes as eyes, andthe round one as the mouth.

As we mentioned before, lira in Leonardo's time meant not only the lira dabraccio but also the ancient Greek and Roman lyra, famlliar to artists from numeroussarcophagi and frescoes; thus, the lyra and its heavier, more complex version, thekithara, were often depicted by Renaissance sculptors and painters.l6

They also occur in fantastic allegorizing shape, usually employing not animalskulls but heads, usually stag heads. Here, the antlers themselves form the lyre armsthat carry the yoke to which the upper ends of the strings are attached. Moreover,the stag was the proverbial allegory of speed, including that of sound and music, inRenaissance art. One of our examples (illus. 5.r4) shows a detail from a cas;one byBartolommeo di Giovanni in the Louvre, "The Wedding of Thetis and Peleus" (R. F.

$46)." A centaur (probably Chiron) crowned with vine leaves competes withApollo. Apollo plays the customary guitar of the time. The centaur swings a largeplectrum to strike the classical seven strings of the stag-head lyre.

,Another more complex stag-head lyre is found in Filippino Lippi's Allegory ofMusic (illus. 5.r5). This is a combination of utmost realism in the stag head with apedantic and an archaeologically correct depiction of the shape of the yoke of ancientkitharas (illus. 5.16). Because Filippino could not find an appropriate spot on the staghead to attach the lower ends of the seven strings, he duplicated the yoke to formanother similar crossbar. Allegorical instruments such as these two stag-head lyres

15. The widely curving-out spiral tendrils may be taken as evidence that they were thought of asbeing made of metal, not wood, perhaps of silver. On the use of silver in musical instruments, see alsoP.72.

16. For instance, the beautiful kithara in the hands of Erato in Raphael's Parnassus in the Stanzadella Segnatura in the Vatican. See Emanuel Wintemitz, "Musical Archaeology of the Renaissance inRaphael's Parnassus," in Rendiconti della Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia, XXV[, 1952-54,reprinted in Musicnl lnstruments, chap. 14.

17. I want to express my thanks to Laurence Marceillac of the Louvre for the information that thepainter is Bartolommeo di Giovanni, changing the earlier attribution to Piero di Cosimo.

5.15. Detail from Filippino Lippi's AlIe-gory of Music. Kaiser FriedrichMuseum, Berlin.

5.16. Detail of illus. 5.r5.

56 THE MYSTERY oF THE SKULL LYRE

were frequently used in stage performances and feste in the fifteenth and sixteenthcenfuries.18

So much about fantastic and allegorical instruments made of animal heads. Letus remind ourselves of Vasari's statement, which called Leonardo's instrument a

"teschio" (skull), not a testa (head). Skulls in many forms, animal and human,pervade Renaissance art. They play a role in many religious and mythological paint-ings; the beauty of the shape of some skulls is admired for its own sake, and it ishardly an exaggeration if we speak of a "craniomania."

In Windsor AN. B r9o58v (B4rv) we find probably the most delicately shadedhuman skull among a number of related drawings in the Fogli d'Anatomia. The leftand right halves of the skull show different aspects to the student of anatomy (illus.

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18. See Winternitz, "Musical Instruments for the Stage."

5.r8. Prcparation for the Entombment of Christ, Carpaccio. Dahlem Museum, Berlin.


Not intended for anatomical studies but for allegorical purposes is anotherskull painted as a memento mori on the back of a panel with a portrait of a youth,now in the collection of the Duke of Devonshire, Chatsworth. The skull stands in adark niche of a wall; beneath it is the inscription "Insigne sum Ieronymi Casii." Themodeling of the skull is masterly, in a sfumato comparable to that of the skull inWindsor ryo58 v. The portrait of the youth is generally attributed to Boltraffio, whowas mentioned as Leonardo's favorite collaborator.le

One of the most striking examples of skulls and bones used as symbols of thedecomposition of the mortal body is found in Carpaccio's great picture in the Staat-liche Gemiilde-Sammlungen, Berlin-Dahlem, which I may call, di{ferently from itscustomary title, Preparations for the Entombment of Christ (illus. 5.r8).

The scenario follows precisely the words in the Bible but adds a profoundcomment, the contrast between the supernatural beauty of the bodv of Christ,sleeping, as it were, and the reign of decay around it: the new grave cut into the rock,the new door being fitted, ]oseph of Arimathea, the clean linen prepared in thebackground, the figures of Mary, St. |ohn, and Magdalene.20

The accent, however, is on the foreground: the marble table bearing the bodyof Christ and surrounded by a profusion of skulls and bones and other symbols ofdecay and putrescence. The earthquake, which rent the veil in the Temple, has alsoshaken the rocks and opened the graves (Matthew z8:5r,52). A headless remnant ofa decaying body tries with a withered hand to clutch a corner of Christ's loincloth.This profound and poetic symbolism is underlined by the fact that this cadaver hasto strain itself beyond all physical possibility to reach the cloth because it is actuallylying far behind the marble table (illus. 5.ag).21

A description of the various bones would require a monograph. There areclusters and several single human skulls. Among the animal skulls we see that of apig and, to the right of the pedestal of the table, the skull of a dog;22 finally, in frontof the stone door leading to the tomb, is a horse skull (illus. 5.2o).23

19. In his chapter "The School of Leonardo da Vinci" ln Leonardo da Vinci (Reynal & Co. [NewYork: 19561, pp. 3a516) Wilhelm Suida refers to the Bolognese poet Girolamo Casio, who, in anepigraph, calls Boltraffio "the only pupil of Leonardo da Vinci" and suggests that this would indicatethat Boltraffio had a position of exceptional distinction among the many students of Leonardo.

zo. Compare the half-naked man in deep meditation leaning against the tree with one of theprotagonists inthe Meditation on the Passion (signed by Carpaccio) in the Metropolitan Museum of Art,Catalogue of ltalian Paintings, Venetian School.

zr. This painting was the first work of art acquired by Wilhelm Bode for the Kaiser FriedrichMuseum in Berlin. With justifiable pride he announced the purchase and described it with a perceptionnot yet rivaled in more recent literature on Carpaccio. Strangely enough, he does not emphasize theallegorical significance of the skulls and bones surrounding the incorruptible flesh. However, he findssome irregularities of linear perspective in the way the dark green cloth is depicted behind Christ'sbody, and the unreality of the large distance between the mummified body behind the table and theedge of the cloth that the withered hand is trying to clutch, an error that, far from a blunder of the artist,underlines the victory of immortality over decay.

zz. I am indebted to Marie A. Lawrence of the American Museum of Natural History for theseidentifications.

23. Carpaccio, who is familiar enough with the Bible to characterize Joseph as "a rich man"(Matthew z7: 5)by his elegant clothing, would be at a loss to explain the presence of animal bones. Thetombs shaken by the earthquake yielded only human relics (Matthew z7:5r-57).

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5.r9. Detail of illus. 5.r8

Detail of illus. 5.r8, including a

horse skull.5.20.

6o THE MYSTERY OF THE SKULL LYRE

5.2r. Juxtapositionof humanandanimal skulls. Engraving by Battista Franco

The fascination with skulls, human as well as animal, continued after Leonar-do's time. An extreme example can be found in the engraving by Battista Franco(illus.5.zr), aVenetianpainterandengraverborninr4gs.Itcomparesalargeheapofanimal bones, of dogs and cats to be specific,2a with human skulls in all possiblepositions-intriguing to a master of perspective.

While discussing skulls in Renaissance art, we should at least mention theancient Roman bucranio. It was customary to decorate temple friezes, especially ofthe Doric order, with bovine skulls, often crowned with flowers or carrying gar-lands. In friezes of the Ionic and the Corinthian order these skulls carry festoonsof fruit and flowers attached to the horns.2s The custom of bucrania was revivedin Renaissance Italy with ram skulls often replacing those of the sacrificial bulls.Michelangelo adapted the ram skull to his particular decorative vocabulary.

In Donatello's time the shape was utilized for the form of shields, or scudi. Acharacteristic variety of scudi appears in his own works in a more or less stylized way

24. Again I credit Marie A. Lawrence of the American Museum of Natural History for theidentification.

25. IllustrationsofbucraniaofthistypecanbeseenintheEncyclopedialtaliana,vol.S,pp.zr,zz.

5.22 St. George with a scudo,Donatello. Museo Nazionale,Florence.

5.23. Four shields in different form, inThe Resurrection by Donatello, rightpulpit in San Lorenzo, Florence.

5.24. Donatello, Marzocco, with heraldicshield. Museo Nazionale, Flor-ence.

5.25. Emblematic shields attached to tlne Tree of Life,

Giorgione. Louvre, Paris.

_-_d

THE MYSTERY oF THE SKULL LYRE 53

approximating the shape of the teschio di caoallo, or horse skull. His statue of St.George in the Museo Nazionale, Florence (illus. 5.zz) holds a long, slender shieldvaguely echoing the teschio. His low relief of the Resurrection in the right pulpit inSan Lorenzo, Florence, depicts four different shields near the legionnaires ileepingin front of the tomb (illus. 5.4). Two of the shields are broad ant exquisitely deco-rated in relief and are standing on the tomb, one of them with incurving, the otherwith straight, outlines. The third slend er scudo, close in outline to the teichio, is onthe extreme right supporting the left elbow of one of the sleeping soldiers. Thefourth large and asymmetrical one shows the heraldic sign of theicoipion. Anotherscudo, likewise in the Museo Nazionale, is held by the paws of a Marzocco,26 theheraldic Florentine lion. It carries the traditional crest of Florence, the lily (illus.5.24).Two emblematic shields attached to the tree of life are found in a painting byGiorgione (illus. 5.2).

In the school of Mantegna several traditional forms merge. In his Battle of theSea Gods a large animal skull serves as a shield (illus. 5.26). Legionnaires carry thetypical shields of horse-skull shape in triumph, as in the Triumpi of Caesar (HamptonCourt), as do Roman soldiers guarding the tomb of Christ (from the predella of thetriptych in San Zeno in Verona, now in the Tours Museum). In the Trial of St. lames(in the fresco in the Eremitani Chapel), a page leaning against the throne of th" judgecarries a highly decorated scudo (illus. 5.27), whose profile approximates thit of ahorse skull (in the Chapel of st. Andrea, Mantua), and there, where Mantegna isburied, a putto exhibits "Mantegna,s shield,, (illus. 5.2g).

The many examples shown above certainly reveal the infatuation of Leonar-do's time with the beauty and decorative value of the skull, human as well as animal,and its employment in many phases of the evolution of forms. Significant as theseexamples are, one single drawing of a teschio di cavallo from the hand of Leonardohimself would bring the problem into direct focus. And indeed, there is one suchdesign: CA 279 va shows, on a large page together with many lunulae , the design fora monumental portal; two teschi, precisely outlining horse skulls, are seen de-cora-tively suspended left and right from its entablature (illus. 5.29).

How can we reconcile the shape of a horse skull with that of a lira da braccio?Not easily, as long as we think of the lira da braccio played with fingerboard and pegdisk pointing upward. But it so happens that in Lombardy and Emilia we findrepresentations of the lira da braccio played with its head down, and in this positionthe shape of the instrument, diminishing in width and depth and ending in a long,thin fingerboard and_ with a round pegbox or peg leaf to accommodate the pegs,matches the shape of the horse skull.

In the frontal view of a horse skull (illus. 5Oo)27 we note the rather flat plane ofthe forehead continuing toward the mouth (a region over which the melody stringswould be strung on the lira da braccio); marked projections some distance beneath

26. From Mars, the legendary protector of ancient Florence.27. I would like to express my gratitude to the American Museum of Natural History, which

made this photograph for me.

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5.26. Animal skull used as shield in the Battle of the Sea Gods, School of Mantegna.

5.27, Mantegna, page with shield, in theTrial of St. lames fresco in theEremitani Chapel, Padua.

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5.28. Putto with shield, Mantegna StAndrea, Mantua.

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THE MYSTERY OF THE SKULL LYRE

the eyes (found in the lira da braccio as the projecting corners of the side wallsdividing the broad section of the soundboard from the narrower section); and therounded termination of the jaws with the teeth (comparable to the peg boxes or pegleaves in many lire da braccio).

Ambrogio de Predis's instrument (illus. 5.3r and 532) is very elegant, with around contour, smoothly incurved and without a sharp divisi,on bltween thebroader and narrower parts of the soundboard. Also, the side walls are incurved,with the front and back of the corpus widely projecting over the side walls. Thehead, carrying five pegs, consists of a leaf-shaped pegbox. There are four melodystrings and one open string.

The origin of this simple but elegant lira da braccio is closely interwoven withthe history of Leonardo's famous Virgin of the Rocks, and it is not at all unlikely that

5.3o. Skull of Arabian stallion in dorsal view. American Museum of Natural History, New york

5.)7 Ambrogio de Predis, angel plavinga lira da braccio; to the right ofLeonardo's Virgin of the Rocks. Na-tional Gallery, London.

5.32. Detail of illus. 5.3r.

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5.33. Lorenzo Costa, Musician playing Lira da Braccio. Louvre, Paris

5.34. Detail of illus. 5.33.

7o THE MYSTERY OF THE SKULL LYRE

he himself took a hand in its design.28 It is played by the left of two musical angels,painted by Ambrogio de Predis for a sumptuous gilded wooden altarpiece, whichwas to accommodate Leonardo's Virgin of the Rocks, some carvings and reliefs, andflanking Leonardo's painting, the playing angels. The angel opposite the lira dabraccio player plays a lute.2e

The other lira da braccio of interest to us here is found in one of two mysteriouspaintings by Lorenzo Costa, painted for the studiolo of Isabella d'Este in the PalazzoDucale in Mantua and now in the Louvre. Both resemble actual stage sets.3oIn one ofthese paintings, frequently referred to as The Court of the Muses of lsabella d'Este, fourmusicians encircle a central scene, one probably representing Orpheus enrapturedand looking toward heaven; he plays a lira da braccio (illus. 5.33 and 5.34). Theinstrument has four melody strings and one open string. It is simpler in workman-ship than the one by Ambrogio de Predis. The side walls meet the soundboard andthe back without any projections. There is no gradual tapering from the n'ide sectionof the soundboard toward the fingerboard but a sudden narrowing of the rvide partwith the sound holes toward a narrower part, which then narrows dorr-n even moretoward the neck. Thus, the outline of the body is marked by two projecting corners/exactly in the manner of a horse skull.

Finally, it may be pointed out that the horse-skull shape rvas occasionallygiven to other instruments. One is an unusual fiddle (illus. 5.35) plaved by one oftwo angels in front of the throne of the Blessed Virgin, in a sacra cont,ersazione byFrancia, now in the Hermitage. Here the resemblance to a horse skull appears only ifwe disregard the long, thin neck attached to the instrument. The other instrument isa ghironda (hurdy-gurdy) played by a boy in a group of musicians in a pastoralsetting by Giulio and Domenico Campagnola (illus. 5.36 and 5.3).31

I have tried to put together the facts about the artistic and musical currents towhich Leonardo's silver lyre owed its invention. We have, alas, no drawing or anyother visual statement from Leonardo's hand to suggest its shape.32 But because weknow that it was a lira da braccio, one of the most subtle bowed instruments everknown, and served the improvisations enthusiastically acclaimed at the Sforzacourt, we may safely assume that it was not a jocular, fantastic, or grotesque instru-ment but rather the very opposite of the goat-jaw, bird-beak composite with whichwe introduced this chapter.

Vasari says that it is "partially of silver"; no doubt the other material used was

28. The work was commissioned by the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception in a contractof 1483 to three painters, Leonardo and two brothers, Ambrogio and Evangelista de Predis. Its history iscomplicated by a dispute between the confraternity and the painters that lasted no less than z5 yearsand was settled only in r5o8. Evangelista had died in r49r.

29. Angela Ottino della Chiesa, The Complete Paintings of Leonardo da Vinci (New York: Harry N.Abrams, 196), p. y ff .

3o. See Wintemitz, "Musical Instruments for the Stage."

3r. Metropolitan Museum of Art, Print Departmentt9z5.t; Hind H.499.n.

32. Von Seidlitz (Leonardo daVinci, p. 445, n. 16o) mentions numerous drawings of Leonardorepresenting the silver lyre or related to it. Actually, not one of them has anything to do with the silverlyre.

5.35. Francia, two angels, the left oneplaying fiddle, from St. Lawrenceand St. lerome. Hermitage.

5.36. Giulio and Domenico Campag-nola, group of musicians in a pas-toral setting (H 499.rr Hind).

5.j7. Detail of illus. 5.36.


wood. The combination of silver and wood in instruments was not infrequent at the

time. We know from the correspondence of Isabella d'Este with her favorite instru-ment maker, Gusnasco, that silver was combined with various woods. If the sound-ing board was to face the audience, it was probably this most striking element thatwas fashioned in the shape of the front of a horse skull, from the noble brow to the

soft nostrils. The softly rounded shape of the skull with its almost straight vertical

axis of the forehead would offer an ideal basis for stretching bowed strings over it.

We can see this flat or, rather, subtly curved front in the Colleoni horse, so familiar to

Leonardo from his Verrocchio days (see itlus. 5.6). This would leave the side walls

and back of the corpus for wood. Perhaps the pegs and the pegbox, or at least its

front, may also have been fashioned of silver for visual harmony.Vasari gives a special reason for using silver: "accio che l'harmonia fosse con

maggior tuba33 e piu sonora di voce" [so that there would be produced a harmony ofa larger tone volume and greater sonority of voicel. But he does not sav whether this

is his own opinion or whether he heard this reason from Giovio or another eye-

witness of Leonardo's performances.

33. Tuba, originally meaning "trumpet," is used here as a picturesque metaphor for loudness.

CHAPTER SIX

Jeste, Theater, and Other €ntertainments

The last decade before the dramatic end of il Moro's reign in Milan in499 throughthe occupation by France, the imprisonment of the Duke, and the sack of Milan, wasa period of almost incessant glamorous festivities. In addition to the traditionalreligious feasts and carnival festivities (spassi carnmaleschi) there were the cele-brations of court and political events such as weddings, births, and conclusions ofalliances. There were pageants and masques of all kinds , giostre, tornei, carri trionfali,and above all, spettacoli teatrali.l

What an outburst of artistic creativity if we consider the number of. feste, therank of the great artists participating,2 and the artistic energy of the common people;only a trickle of art objects is left of this splendor in our museums today.

If we mention only the most famous occasions of the celebrations, we have tolist:

Sept. 23, 24, t489: jousting in Pavia offered by il Moro;june 13, 74goi a great feast in the castle of Milan for the betrothal of Gian Galeazzo

sforza and Isabella d'Aragonia, terminating with a performance of the paradiso;

r. A good survey of the varieties of t'este in the quattrocento and cinquecento can be gained bythe 35 pages devoted to the feste by J. Burckhardt in his monumental Kultur der Renaissance, pp. 355 lf .

There he discusses the kinds of feste, especially processions, traditional in the Renaissance. Among theecclesiastical ones he mentions reliquary processions, sanctifications, baptisms, weddings, funerals;among the secular events, victory celebrations, state visits (such as the welcomes accorded new ambas-sadors), pastoral feste, and carnivals. We should perhaps add the festa of the Nunziata and the tra-ditional celebrations throughout the church calendar year of the more important saints. Burckhardtalso mentions, apparently as characteristic, the institution of the traveling Florentine festaiuoli (organizer of feste).

z. Vasari, who in his descriptions of artists often discusses their merits as organizers of feste,also includes feste organized by contemporaries of Leonardo. He describes Brunelleschi's ingegni delparadiso di San Felice and his famous Festa della Nunziata with a detailed description of the engineeringwork (machina). La Cecca, a Florentine engineer, who in his youth was an excellent carpenter, or-ganized the "festa di San Giovanni a processioni, apparati di feste per ciascuno quartiere," including"Cristo levato di soPra un monte, benissimo fatto di legname, da una nuvola piena di Angeli e portatoin cielo lChrist carried upward from a mountain well-fashioned of wood, by a cloud filled with angelsand borne to heavenl."

73

74 FESTE/ THEATER, AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS

1490: the first performance of Poliziano's Fatsola di Orfeo ed Eurydice in Marmirolo, Man-tua, the summer residence of the dukes of Mantua, closely related to Milan by family ties;

Jan. t7, r49r: the wedding of Lodovico Sforza and Beatrice d'Este, the sister of Isabellad'Este, in the chapel of the castle of Pavia, followed by a large feast in the great ballroom;

Jan. 23, r49r: the wedding of Alfonso d'Este and Anna Sforza;

Jan. 26, r49r: jousting in the palace of Galeazzo da Sanseverino, Milan;t49z: feasts for the conclusion of the alliance with the king of France and for the election

of the pope;

Jan. 1493: feast for the birth of il Moro's first son, Massimiliano;end of t493: the wedding of the Emperor Maximilian Habsburg and Bianca Maria

(sister of Gian Galeazzo);1496: great feast with a performance of Dqna| in the palace of Giovan Francesco San-

severino in Milan.

The splendor and glamour of the frequent festivities, pageants, masques andmasquerades, triumphal processions, jousts and tournaments, balls, and mock ar-chitecture, all this with a great variety of themes from the sacred and pagan-mythological to the satirical and jocular-can hardly be imagined todar', althoughwe have reports of guests and visitors, correspondence between the courts, lettersfrom participants to friends, and other documents in archives. In some cases thecommissions, orders, and instructions to the theaters and other n'orkshops andcooPerating artisans, as well as expense estimates and bills, provide valuable in-sights.

And even if verbal reports convey at least some idea of the visual splendor,how can we today evoke the mood and impact of the music that permeated all thesefeasts?

There is, however, a source of information that has not yet been exhausted; thefeasts left an echo or a reflection in many paintings of great and lesser artists, and it isthese works that could be consulted much more than heretofore to evoke the flavor.3

The court of the Sforzas favored lavish entertainments, and it would have beenstrange if a person such as Leonardo, with so many accomplishments in the visualarts and music, had not participated in many of them. As for musical performance,we have above all the word of Vasari that Leonardo as an improviser excelled allother musicians at the court, implying frequent performances there. For his organi-zatton of plays, feasts, masquerades, and processions, we have significant docu-ments: a number of important sketches of stage settings, theatrical machinery andcostumes, and the contemporary voice of Paolo Giovio, "Fuit ingenio valde, cominitido, liberali, vultu autem longe venustissimo; et cum elegantiae omnis de-litiarumque maxime theatralium mirificus inventor ao arbiter esset, ad liramquescyte caneret, cunctis per omnem aetatem principibus mire placuit."

Translated into modern Italian it is: "Aveva un'indole molto affabile, brillante,generosa, un aspetto bellissimo e poich6 era giudice e mirabile inventore di ogni cosa

3. See Emanuel Wintemitz, Les FAtes de la Renaissance, I (Paris: Editions du Centre National de laRecherche Scientifique, 1956; reprinted as chap. ;.6in Musical Instruments and Their Symbolism inWesternArt, zd ed. [New Haven: Yale University Press, t9791).

FESTE/ THEATER/ AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS

bella, specialmente nel campo degli spettacoli teatrali, e (per di piu) cantava accom-pagvandosi abilmente colla lira, egli fu straordinariamente caro per tutta la vita atutti i Principi."a

My English translation is: "He had a very affable, brilliant and generous temp-erament, an extremely attractive appearance, and, since he was a connoisseur andmarvelous inventor of all beautiful things, especially in the field of stage perfor-mances, and (in addition) sang masterfully to his own accompaniment on the lira, hewas beloved by all princes through his whole life."

The prolific historian Paolo Giovio, born in ry43, thirty-one years afterLeonardo, wrote repeatedly about Leonardo, long before Vasari. I chose the remarkquoted above because of its emphasis on Leonardo's occupation with music andstage performances. Giovio, a born Comasco, possessed in Como a sumptuouspalazzo, decorated with frescoes by his young friend, Giorgio Vasari. It was on thisoccasion that Giovio, who had established a large collection of portraits of artists andalso written several biographies of artists, including a short one of Leonardo, per-suaded Vasari to begin his famous Le Vite degli Artisti.s

It is interesting that Giovio referred also to Leonardo's occupation with stageperformances. He credits him with much inventiveness, especially in the field oforganizing stage perforrnances (". . . raro e maestro inventore d'ogni eleganza e

singolarmente di dilettevoli ad teatrali spettacoli, possedendo anche la musicaesercitata sula lira, in canto dolcissimo . . .").But we have reliable information abouthis participation in only two complex stage performances (Paradiso and Danad) andindirect evidence about his role in the performance of Poliziano's Faaola di Orfeo ed

Eurydice in Mantua. Leonardo's participation in theatrical spectacles illuminates hisrange of musical interests because these spectacles were permeated by music, vocaland instrumental, and could be regarded in more than one sense as forerunners ofopera.6 They also employed in leading roles improvising virtuosi who accompaniedtheir own recitations on the lute and lira da braccio. We will focus only on the threestage events mentioned above.

On June t3, 74go the performance of the Paradiso took place in the CastelloSforzesco in Milan to celebrate the wedding of Gian Galeazzo Sforza to Isabellad'Aragon. The text for the performance was written by Bernardino Bellincioni, thecourt poet of il Moro, a fertile and an adaptable author of poems for special occa-sions. Bellicioni's introduction to the Paradiso mentions that this title was chosenbecause "the performance included a paradise created with great genius by theFlorentine master, Leonardo da Vinci."

Bernardo Bellincioni was born in t45z in Florence and in his youth became aprot6g6 of Lorenzo Magnifico. He lived for a while at the Gonzaga court in Mantuaand finally, at the court of Lodovico Sforzain Milan, where, as the official court poet,

4. This admirably simple translation of Giovio's stilted Renaissance Latin was sent to me byAugusto Marinoni.

5. See Vasari's biography of himself in Le opere di G . Vasari, ed. Milanesi (19o6), vol. 7 , p. 682.6. The traditional overestimation of the Camerata at the end of the fifteenth century as the birth

hour of opera does not do justice to the importance of improvisation in the quattrocento.

75

76 FESTE/ THEATER/ AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS

he became a rather facile maker of adulatory and unctuous verses including manypolitical, satirical, amorous, and facetious sonnets-not living up to the promise ofhis youth.

Bellincioni's text of the Festa del Paradiso was nothing but an occasion forLeonardo's brilliant stage machinery and showmanship. Witness the title of Bellin-cioni's festival poem, if poem it be, given in the first line of the text: "'Festa' or'Rappresentazione' entitled 'PARADlso,' which was commissioned by Signor Moroin honor of the Duchess of Milan, and which was so entitled because it has beenorganized by the great genius and artistry of Master Lionardo Vinci, the Florentine,with all the seven revolving planets; and the planets were represented by men in theform and garb as described by the poets, and all speak in praise of the aforemen-tioned Duchess Isabella. "T

The performance was introduced by the sound of "pifarie tromboni" (shawmsand trombones), followed by the roll of drums accompanying a Neapolitan dance inwhich the bride participated, and then a long line of masques conveying the wishesof the royal houses of Spain, France, Poland, Hungary, the emperor, and others.Then, after an "international" dance, the performance of the play itself began.Paradise was symbolizedby a gigantic hollow hemisphere, all gilded inside, withmany luminous stars and several fissures in which the seven planets were insertedin the order of their magnitude; on the rim appeared in full illumination the twelvesigns of the zodiac.

There were heard "molti canti et soni molto dolci et suavi," and an angelappeared-as was customary in sacred plays (sacrerappresentazioni) of the Annuncia-tion. To PrePare the audience "to see great things to honor Isabella and her virtue,"]upiter sings the praise of the Duchess Isabella, "the most beautiful, lovely, graceful,and splendid woman," whereupon Apollo, who considered himself the most beauti-ful creature of the universe, felt slighted. But he is reprimanded by Jupiter, whonow descends from the Paradise together with all the other divine representatives ofthe planets, takes his position on top of a mountain, and dispatches Mercury toinform Madonna Isabella that he had come here with all his retinue to bring her thethree Graces and the seven Virtues. There is now great coming and going of Mercuryand the Graces and the seven Nymphs, until Apollo offers the duchess and theguests a booklet with sonnets composed, of course, by Bellincioni. The Graces singthe praise of the duchess, and then the seven Virtues rise to sing and finatly accom-pany Isabella into the bridal chamber.

Two comments may be necessary. The traffic inside the Paradise happens noton a horizontal stage but in the vertical, defeating the normal laws of gravity, and it ishere that Leonardo could excel with his stage machinery.s Also, all the lauding and

7. "FESTA ossia rappresentazione che fece fare il Signore Lodovico in laude della Duchessa diMilano, e cosi chiamasi, perche vi era fabbricato con il grande ingegno ed arte di masetro Lionardo VinciFiorentino IL PARADISO con tutti li sette pianeti che giravano, e li pianeti erano rappresentati dauomini nella forma ed abiti che si descrivono dai poeti, e tutti parlano in Lode dela prefata DuchessaIsabella."

8. A detailed analysis of the stage machinery and its intricate engineering problems is beyondthe dimensions of this book, even more so since Kate Steinitz has given many of the essential expla-

FESTE, THEATER, AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS 77

praising are to be imagined not in spoken language but as sung by choir or soli, andprobably all with instrumental accompaniment, the soli, for instance, with lute orlira da braccio.

No sketches from Leonardo's hand have survived that can clearly be con-nected with the preparation of the stage machinery or scenery of the paradiso, but wemay assume that Leonardo used contrivances similar to those that we know wereused in the preparation of the DanaE in495. At any rate Brunelleschi's machine totransport the Annunciation angel through the air must have been well known to himfrom his years in Florence.e

The story of Dana6 is not an easy topic for dramatization. Dana6 was the onlychild of Akrisios, King of Argos; according to an oracle of the Delphian god, hewould be killed by the son of his daughter; therefore, he locked his daughter in abronze chamber in the court of his palace. Through an aperture in the roof Jupiterapproached her as golden rain. When it became clear that Dana€ was pregnant,Akrisios locked her up again, to dispose of her after the child's birth; the child wasPerseus. Akrisios, who had escaped to Larissa, was killed there by perseus.

The audience was treated to the following presentation. First, instrumentalmusic was sounded behind the scene. Then, "beautiful sky became visible, withJupiter and the other gods, and infinite lamps for stars." Mercury descended fromOlympus with an amorous message, like the Annunciation angel in well-knownsacred representations, and informs Danae!, imprisoned in the tower, of the ardor ofJupiter. The latter transforms himself into gold and creates a golden rain. Next,Danad becomes a star-one sees her ascending to heaven "to music so loud that itseems the palace would collapse"-and the nymphs, going hunting and observingthe new star with its own music, beg Jupiter to explain this to them. By order of thegod, she was made an immortal goddess, whereupon she herself, in midair, ex-plains the mystery, rePorts the birth of Perseus, and becomes rejuvenated to consoleKing Akrisios. Thus the cruel end of the mythical story, the murder of King Akrisiosby his grandson Perseus, the child of Dana6, is replaced by an arbitrary sori of happyending more fitting for a wedding celebration, and no one was surprised whenApollo with his lira descended to earth and sang ("canta lungamente,j, ending hisstrophes with the praise of Il Moro.

Since r9r8 the Metropolitan Museum of Art has owned a precious leaf withdrawings and text that clearly refer to the play of Dana€1o and was probably writtenand designed in preparation for this feast (illus. 6.t).r,

nations in her ingenious Vinciana lecture, Leonardo Architetto Teatrale e Organizzator di Feste,IX LetturaVinciana (Vinci-Biblioteca Leonardiana, r5 Apr. 1969). On a more frivolousnote, it is difficult to repressthe question: What could the theatrical engineering and the showmanship of a Leonardo have done tosolve the perennial embarrassment of Bayreuth: the Rhine Maidens?

9. Brunelleschi defeated gravity two generations earlier with the same engineering skill whenhe sent his Archangel Gabriel down through the air at the Feast of the Annurrciation at tf,e piazza S.Felice in Florence, where a complex and an enormous apparatus was constructed showing two cicleswith- angels circling the celestial sphere, from which Gabriel flew down in an almond-snap--ea machinefcr the Annunciation.

ro. Metropolitan Museum ot' Art Bulletin g Q9fi): zr4.rr. Marie Herzfeld, La Rappresentazione della "Danai)" Organizzata da Leonardo (Raccolta Vinciana

Xl, rgzo-zz), pp. zz6-28.


6.r. Drawings and text by Leonardo for the performance of Danad including a niche for Pluto. Metropoiitan Museum of Art, New York.

The upper part shows a list of dramatis personae. On the right are numbersand fractions of numbers, which are interpreted by Kate Steinitz as computations ofthe costs of the costumes for single actors.12 The right half of the page shows the

ground plan of the stage with the tower of Dana6 and the terrace in the foreground,where Danad is supposed to be when she converses with Mercury. The large win-dow in the tower seems to repeat the architectural motif drawn in the center of the

page.t3The niche mentioned, drawn near the middle of the page, shows in its center

an enthroned deity in a mandorla surrounded by flames. This middle part is

crowned by an elaborate vault and flanked by two niches, a pet motif of Leonardo, as

we will see later.The grotto or vault with side niches is reflected not only in this flaming man-

dorla (Metropolitan Museum of Art)1a but also in related technical stage designs

rz. Steinitz, Leonardo Architetto, p. tz.r3. See the detailed explanation in ibid., p. 13, and the deviating interpretation by Pedretti, For

the opinion of the latter see also Steinitz, Le Lieu Theatral a la Renaissance (P aris , 1964) , pp . 39-4o.:.4. Dr. Marie Herzfeld is the first scholar to point out, in La Rappresentazione della "Danai," p. zz6,

the relation between the drawing by Leonardo of the flaming mandorla and his participation in the

organization of the performance of Danad by Baldassare Taccone in Milan. She also enumerates Pas-sages in the play related to musical accompaniment.

78

u=< ,t,.\

FESTE/ THEATER/ AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS 79

(Arundel z3rv and Arundel zz4r) and in distant areas of Leonardo's interests, that is,in church architecture (CA 37 r) and the anatomy of the human heart (Quadernid'Anatomia II ro r).

Arundel z63 (BM) z3r v (illus. 5.2) shows an open grotto with a person in thecenter between two columns that are evidently the hinges for moving the complexmachinery for opening the mountain to reveal Pluto. A detailed description of thecomplex machinery is not necessary here because it has been worked out by KateSteinitz in Leonardo Architetto Teatrale e Organizzatore di Feste, inIX Lettura Vinciana,r5 Apr. 1969. Leonardo's comments to his sketches say: "The mountain opens-Pluto appears in his residence. . . as soon as the paradise of Pluto opens, thereshould be devils who play on pots to create infernal noises-there should be death,the Furies, Cerberus, and many naked, weeping putti; there are also fires made invarious colors; dances follow." Leonardo, to remind himself, drew in miniature twoof these pots, at the right edge of the page just above the last text section. Small as thesketch is, it shows clearly the characteristic shape of these noisemakers and the twosticks inserted into the membranes. Such visual memos are characteristic of Leonar-do's working technique. 1s

The next sketch, Arundel263 (BM) zz4 r (illus. 6.3), shows more details of thestage construction and moving mechanism, and the mountain itself in a closed andan oPen state. The open mountain is symmetrically conceived, with a large vaultedcentral cavern and two small lateral entrances into corridors or galleries. We recallthe smaller pattem in Arundel 263 (BM) 231v.

The example from architecture, CA 37 ra, shows one of Leonardo's manysketches with sections through a polygonal church (illus. 6.4). The example fromanatomy, Quaderni d'Anatomia II ro r, shows one of Leonardo's sections throughthe human heart (illus. 6.il- One wonders on which of the many levels of creativeconsciousness such analogies of design-Leonardo may have preferred to call themfigure or figurazione-take shape, designs that clearly exceed the region of merelyaesthetic similarity. 16

The delights for eye and ear devised for the entertainment of noble guests atweddings, receptions, and other public occasions are overshadowed by one singlespectacle on a much higher level, a real drama and the imaginative rebirth of anancient legend, the fateful history of Orpheus' love for Eurydice: Poliziano's greatFaoola.It most likely exerted a remarkable influence on contemporary stage perfor-mances. The precise date of the first performance of Orpheus in Marmirolo, Mantua,has been controversial for many years but it seems today that the prevailing opinionis r4go.

15. MacCurdy misunderstands and places the devils in twelve pots to resemble the mouths ofhell, not a very convincing architecture for the gates of hell. He overlooks that olle (pots) mean verycommon folk instruments that produce a shrieking noise. A more detailed explanation of these cac-carelle or Rommelpots is given in chap. 9.

16. See Emanuel Winternitz, "Anatomy the Teacher: On the Impact of Leonardo's AnatomicalResearch on his Musical and Other Machines," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 3, no. 4(Aug. 196): 44-47.

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6.5. Leonardo: cross section of a human heart showing ,,vault,,, ,,nave,,, and ,,aisles.,,

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FESTE/ THEATER/ AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS 83

It has been said that such theatrical spectacles were paid for by the courts andserved for such functions as state celebrations, and therefore had to be of a light,cheerful character. Nothing could be further from the truth, if we considerPoliziano's Faaola. The sudden death of Eurydice, bitten by a snake, the visit toHades, the parting forever, the fruitless argument with the Furies to be admitted thesecond time to Pluto; the mourning and retreat to the wilderness, the chase by thebacchantes and ensuing decapitation-in short, fear and sorrow, tears and blood-provided little to amuse a bridal couple.

Nothing is known of Leonardo's direct participation in the famous andepoch-making first performance of Poliziano's Orfeo in Mantua. But Leonardomust have known Poliziano from his years in Florence, and the performer of the roleof Orpheus, who improvised on the lira da braccio, had been a disciple and friend ofLeonardo: Atalante Migliorotti. 17

The performance set a shining example and shows more than any other spec-tacle of the time the intimate interweaving of a text with vocal and instrumentalmusic.

The music accompanying the performance of Poliziano's Orfeo has not come tous, mainly because much of it was improvised. Yet there is a way to assess howcentral a role it must have played in this drama: to list methodically the stagedirections requiring music, and to focus on other musical matters woven into the text

iIIII

r

trt-

Woodcut depicting Orpheus teach-ing the beasts by playing the lira dabraccio. From an edition ofPoliziano's Cose aulgare, Bologna,1494.

t'

TTIERCVRIO ANN\TNTIAIA FF-STA.

Orpht* c***reio allinfrmo tatolt.!i\le non potc irrurr laleggt d:ra:Chcl poucrcllo indrirrc frhuoifc:

r7. See Vasari's remark about the arrival of Leonardo, together with Atalante, at the Milan court.

84 FEsTE/ THEATER/ AND oTHER ENTERTAINMENTS

(for example, the various musical instruments mentioned) that contributed symboli-cally to the atmosphere. Also, it is often not the stage directions that betray the use ofmusic but the situation itself and the dramatic context in comparison with similarcontexts in the contemporary sacre rappresentazioni. For instance, at the words"Mercurio annunzia la festa" we recall the Archangel Gabriel introducing himself insacred plays as the bearer of the divine message.

It goes without saying that in the illustrations of Poliziano's Legenda, Orpheusis often depicted playing the lira da braccio, as in the title page of an early edition ofthe Legenda (illus. 6.6), andis mentioned by the announcer of the play, Mercurius, asentering Hades singing ("Orfeo cantando all' inferno la tolse"). In the conversationof the three shepherds Aristo calls for the "zampogr.a" (bagpipes) to make Eurydicesing, and in the famous canzona "Udite selve, mie dolce parole" has a dialogue withhis dear zamPogna. Orpheus appears on the mountain top "Cantando in su la lira"(singing and accompanying himself on his lyre-no doubt the lira da braccio); hisLatin verses do not fail to invoke "lyra," "cantlJs," and "cithatam"; likewise, hislament for the death of Eurydice invokes "sconsolatalira" and the "dolce cetra"(kithara).

When "Orfeo cantando giunge all' inferno," Pluto's first words are "Chi dcostui che con si dolce nota Muove l'abisso e con l'ornata cetra? [Who is it who canmove with such sweet sound the black abyss with an adomed kithara?1."

I will not continue this gathering of musical allusions but will draw attention tothe climax: the confrontation between Pluto and Orpheus, a confrontation betweenthe power of dominion and the power of music, both represented by unsurpassablepoetic condensation in the opposition of the fateful symbols, the sceptre and theplectrum. In the yielding words of Pluto:

I' son contento che a si dolce plettroS'inchini la potenzia del mio scettro.

I'm satisfied that the power of my sceptreBows to the sweetness of your plectrum.

We turn now to the many sketches by Leonardo, who evidently served in thepreparation of pageants, most from the Windsor Catalogue and one from theMadrid Notebooks. In these sketches the tailoring and structure and decoration ofthe fabric, and the shape of the hats and shoes, are so marked that they amountto instructions to the technicians in charge of the pageants or stage performances.

Illustration 5.7 (Windsor 12573 r) is a drawing in black chalk that shows anelderly prisoner with a short beard, in tattered garments, with shackled wrists andfeet, supporting himself with a heavy stick and extending his left hand, perhapsbegging.

There seems to be no doubt that the drawing was made for a masqueradecosfume, but the date and actual occasion are controversial. A masque in the houseof Galeazzo da San Severino on June 26, r49r, has been suggested by seidlitzand Bodmer; a masque at Amboise after ryt5by Popp.rt

t8. See the list of suggestions as to the date and occasion in the Windsor catalogue, p. rrr.

6.7. Drawing by Leonardo: prisonerwith shackled feet and wrists.Windsor 72573 t.

,

6.8. Drawing by Leonardo: youth onhorseback. Windsor r2574.

6.9. Drawing by Leonardo: rider on horse-back camouflaged as a bagpipe.Windsor 12585.

86 FESTE/ THEATER/ AND oTHER ENTERTAINMENTS

Illustration 6.8 (Windsor o574) is a drawing in pen and ink over black chalkthat shows a youth on horseback in an elaborate masquerade costume of a greatvariety of fabrics, with feathers and ribbons. He is armed with a sword and lanceand wears spurs.

Seidlitz suggests the masque in the house ol Galeazzo da San Severino, r49r;Mtiller-Walde suggests a date as early as 1475 for a joust of Giuliano de Medici. See

other suggestions in the Windsor Catalogue, pp. aat, aaz.

Leonardo also drew a fantastic horseback rider, Windsor o585 (illus. 6.9). Thisdrawing has nothing to do with the many figures suggesting rich costumes of differ-ent textiles for the workshops of pageants. It is rather a specter-like phantasm, anexcursion into the realm of fairy tales, certainly as much acclaimed and laughed atby the spectators as it was uncomfortable for the actor. His body has turned intohis instrument, the bagpipe; his belly into the bag, his nose into the chanter. Playerand instrument are fused into one creature.le This drawing has often been mis-interpreted.

Bernard Berenson describes the figure as a "boar-headed man on horseback,playing on a horn" (probably for a masquerade and possibly the one of Galeazzoda San Severino in )anuary a4g7).2o Gerolamo Calvi calls the sketch an allegory;2lWaldemar von Seidlitz describes the figure as a monster on horseback playing a

6.ro. Bagpipe player backward on horse-

back. Woodcut by Barthel Be-

ham. J. Muller, Kritischer Katalog1958, no. rzo.

19. Some allegorical bagpipes are discussed in the following chapter on acoustics.zo. Drazoings ot' the Florentine Painters (New York, r9q), p. 62.

zt. Un'allegoria diLeonardo (Milan, go4), p. 482.

FESTE/ THEATER/ AND oTHER ENTERTAINMENTS 87

clarinet;22 and Edmondo Solmi calls the creature a figure on horseback who sounds areed pipe with his own nose.23 Heinrich Bodmer identifies the monster as "omosalvatico" without further explanation.2a Sir Kenneth Clark interprets the drawingas follows: "A masquerader seated on a horse, which is walking in profile to left.He wears a head like an elephant, with long ears like bat's wings, a curly hornlike a gramophone, and a trunk, on which he is playing as if it were a flute. Healso appears to have a pot belly, and a curly tail."2s No mention is made of a bag-pipe. Giuseppina Fumagalli, in a very interesting article, reviews the earlier inter-pretations and declares, with cogent and elaborate reasons, that our bagpipe man isone of the "omini salvatichi."26

A much coarser and more jocular sketch dealing with a bagpipe is found in thenorth: a hunchbacked bagpiper backward on his horse (illus. 6.ro) in an undatedwoodcut by Barthel Beham.27 Here, bagpipe and man are not magically united as byLeonardo-the instrument is realistically represented with two drone pipes.

Illustration 5.u (Windsor e575), a drawing in pen and ink, and wash overblack chalk, shows a young man striding in a masquerade costume with flutteringsleeves, a cap with feathers, and a rich doublet. His right hand holds a lance, hisleft wrist is on his hip. For the date and occasion, see the many controversial sug-gestions in the Windsor catalogue.2s

Illustration 6.rz (Windsor e576) is black chalk on white paper. A youth stand-ing with his legs apart, his left wrist on his hip, his right hand holding a palm,his bodice consisting of interlaced ribbons, the sleeves with parallel ribbons.

Illustration 5.r3 (Windsor e577) is a female figure in black chalk on whitePaPer. Her left arrn, covered with a cloak, is on her hip; her right arm is coveredby a sleeve made of ribbons.

The hypnotically magic female figure in illustrati on 6.r4 (Windsor lz58r), mys-terious in gesture and expression alike, is certainly not a study for costumes to beused at feasts. It has nothing of the matter-of-fact delineation of the various bro-cades, velvets, and ribbons to guide the tailors in the workshops. Rather, her cos-tume is subtle and impressive with its smooth fall of drapery. However, this draw-ing may very well have been a study for an allegorical figure appearing on one ofthe processional cars in a feast, or even on the stage.2e The little cascade of waterin the left foreground, harmonizing with the only lightly suggested landscape,

zz. "I disegni di Leonardo da Vinci a Windsor," L'Arte t4 Qgrt): 285.23. "La politica di Lodovico il Moro nei simboli di Leonardo," sqitti aarii di erudizione e di critica in

onore di R. Renier (Turin, rgrz), pp. 7r-72.24. Leonardo (Stuttgart, ry1t), p. zo3.25. CatalogueofDrawingsofLeonardodaVinciintheCollectionofHisMajestytheKingatWindsorCastle

(New York and Cambridge, r%il, p.99.26. "Gli. Omini Salvatichi di Leonardo," RaccoltaVinciana 18 (r95o): 129-57.27. JeanMuller, Barthel BehamKritischerKatalog (1958), no. rzo.28. Kenneth Clark, The Drau:ings of Leonardo da Vinci at Windsor Castle , zd ed. , 1968, revised with

the assistance of Carlo Pedretti, vol. z, p. rtz.29. The Windsor Castle catalogue quotes Meller's suggestion that this figure is Matelda, Dante's

guide through Purgatorio, until Beatrice appears.

Drawing by Leonardo: youth withlance in fancy costume. Windsor12575.

6.13. Drawing by Leonardo: female fig-ure with cloak. Windsor 12577.

Drawing by Leonardo: youth hold-ing a palm. Windsor r2576.

6.r2.

'l-

t,Ii. a:.,,;..i ], ir:,.r:.

'e:r,t'r.rr.li*

''

t

6a' X:.v

6.r4. Drawing by Leonardo: allegorical figure pointing. Windsor rz58r.

9o FESTE/ THEATER/ AND OTHER ENTERTAINMENTS

6.15. Drawing by Leonardo: costumedyouth with a three-tiered hat.Madrid MS II folio 76 r.

recalls Leonardo's liking for the melody of falling water in gardens, as stated in hisnotebooks as a suggestion for his garden architecture. For instance, in L 78 r hesays, "Make a harmony with the different falls of water, as you have seen at thefountain of Rimini."

In Madrid MS II folio 76 r, a charming little figure is jotted down with a fewrapid strokes in the center of the page (illus . 6.ril. Unfortunately the instrumentplayed by this youth is not recognizable. It might be the little organ shown in thesketch to the right of his head or the viola mentioned twice in the text. In any casehe is a musician in fancy garb; his three-tiered hat,30 short pleated tunic with squareneck, and shepherd buskins characterize him as a participant in a masquerade orstage entertainment.

Among Leonardo's contributions to the divertissements of the court are therebuses, or picture-puzzles.3l Both sides of one large leaf in Windsor Castle are

30. My colleague at the Metropolitan Museum, Dr. OIga Raggio, chairman of the Department ofEuropean Sculpture and Decorative Arts, has kindly led my attention to the fact that similar hats occurin the embroideries after designs by Pollaiuolo in the Museo dell' Opera del Duomo in Florence. SeeSascha Schwabacher , Die Stickerien nach Entwilrfen des Antonio Pollaiuolo in der Opera di S. Maria del Fiorezu Elormz (Strassburg, rgrr), especially plates xix, xxxi. The designs for the bibtical scenes depicted theremay also have been used for or inspired by the performances of sacred plays.

3r. The first and pioneering book on this subject is Augusto Marinoni's I Rebus di Leonardo daVinci, raccolti e interpretati (Florence: Olschki, 1954), together with his essay "Una Virtu Spirituale." Theillustrations following are reproduced from his book.

liS ^1)

6.16. Rebus by Leonardo. Windsor rz69zv

6.17, 6.18, and 6.19. Musical instruments(viola, bells, "monacordo") used inrebuses by Leonardo. From AugustoMarinoni, I Rebus di Leonardo da Vinci,nos. 106, ro7, and rz3. Windsor a2692v.

Rebus combining musical scorewith words. Marinoni, no. 88.

Windsor rz69z v.

6.2o. Rebus by Leonardo. Marinoni, no.94. Windsor r:692 v.


full of them (rz59z r and tz59z v). The second (illus. 5.16) includes a number ofmusical instruments that must have been familiar to everyone, for example, theuiola, the campane (bells), and the manocordio. A brief explanation may suffice toshow how they are used in the puzzles:

Marinoniex. ro6, p. zo6 (illus. 6.17): This shows a typical lira da braccio characterizedbythe heart-shaped peg leaf, which at the time of Leonardo was simply called aiola. This,together with the written addition fa, results in aiolata, that is, "violated" or "raped."

Marinoni ex. ro7, p. zo6 (illus. 6.18): After the picture of two bells is written "pochi,"which results in "campane pochi" or "ne campa pochi," which, alluding to phrases orquotations such as "l'uomo non vive di pane solo" (man does not live by bread alone), maymean "bread does not suffice for life."

Marinoniex. r23, p. zr4(illus.6.r9): Thethirdinstrumentillustratedinpicture puzzlesis a monocordo, the venerable one-stringed research instrument of the Pythagoreans, whichlater in the form of manocordio also means the several-stringed claoicordio. "l'mo n'accordo"suggests "I am in accord" or "in agreement."

Much more important for the purposes of this book are his musical examplesor, rather, examples of musical notation, especially because these are the onlyspecimens of musical writing by Leonardo that have been preserved. We havepointed out before that neither Leonardo nor any other improviser of his time wrotedown his own music.

Marinoni ex.94, p.a99 (illus. 6.zo): The rebus shows from left to right the followingpictures: a tree, actually a pear tree ("pero"); a saddle ("sella"); a woman with a sail ("for-tuna"); a notation of two musical syllables (mi, fa); a fern ("felce"); two letters ("ta")followed by a human face ("viso"); and a black spindle ("aspo nero"). The words in par-entheses above, if read in one sentence, say: "Pero se la fortuna mi fa felice tal viso aspon-ero." (But if fortune makes me happy, this face will be shown to you.)

Marinoni ex. 88, p. a95 (illus. 6.zr): This more complex rebus begins with a fishhook("amo"), continues with five musical notes (re, rni, fa, sol, la), and ends with two writtenletters ("2a").Read as a sentence, the result is: "L'amore mi fa sollazar." (Loves makes mecheerful.)

At Leonardo's time in Italy the most popular method of designating the tonesof the scale was not the traditional medieval Guidonian hand expressing every noteby one letter but the solmization (solfeggio) that expresses every tone by a syllable:do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si.

93

PART III

THE THINKER

Scientist, experimenter andpioneer in acoustics, inventor

of new and fantastic instruments

CHAPTER SEVEN

Research on Jcowstics

INTRODUCTION

Leonardo's notebooks contain many ideas about acoustics. Some are apparentlyderived from older authors, many are new ideas, and a large part are the result ofexperiments. To report on all of them in a systematic way-for instance, arrangingthem in a logically progressive order as if each observation corrected or improved thepreceding one-would amount to a falsification because the chronology of Leonar-do's various statements often is not certain.

A great number of analyses of acoustical phenomena in Leonardo's writingsare in many ways related to his ideas about musical instruments. Some of his basic

acoustical experiments are carried out with the help of musical instruments such as

bells, pipes, and stringed instruments. Some inventions of new musical instrumentsare in fact intended to overcome a basic flaw of music, "la malattia della musica," t}:.eall-too-quick fading of the tone.

Considering the variety of Leonardo's observations, one also may be temptedto discuss them against the background of modern acoustics, a formidable andcomplex body of knowledge indeed, dealing with the origin, source, and behavior ofsound, its reflection and refraction, pitch and timbre, as well as the physiology andpsychology of hearing. But such fitting-in of Leonardo's remarks would serve littlepurpose. It should not be forgotten that the present book is not a chapter in thehistory of acoustics or a description of a phase in the history of science.l It is meantonly to contribute to our knowledge about Leonardo's mind and personality, hispersonal way of integrating and interweaving numerous, seemingly divergent in-terests and curiosities, interlacing his artistic creativity with his deep-seated passionfor conceiving the universe as a homogeneous organism.2

r. The reader who wants to inform himself about the status of physics in Leonardo's time mayturn to Roberto Marcolongo, Leonardo daVinci Artista-Scimziafo (Milan: Hopli, r95o).

z. One may wonder why Leonardo's sheer incredible sharpness and rapidity of observation ofphenomena do not lead him to a myopic approach; yet I believe that he is protected from this by two ofhis habits. One is his tendency toward using analogies as a method of research. The other is that he is

97

98 RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS

This is, then, an assessment of the problems as Leonardo saw them, and in hisown words, and with his own sketches and diagrams, including the ancient sourceshe knew. We study the mind of Leonardo as a mirror or reflection of his own notionsof the interrelated and converging laws of nature. Therefore what is needed is not a

pedantic enumeration and scrutiny of Leonardo's sometimes repetitious observa-tions within the framework of the modern theory of sound, but a selection of symp-tomatic ideas showing his quick mind freely leaping from one area of acoustics toanother, connecting the different realms of the senses-the worlds of sound, sight,and smell-uncovering some of their hidden relations, and thus in his own waycontributing to his credo of the unity and organic structure of the universe.

I have preferred to list Leonardo's statements by grouping parallel or similarones together, including repetitious statements, commenting occasionally on incon-sistencies or contradictions, and commenting more extensively on the value of some

notions that stand out by their originality or unorthodox imagination, or because

they throw an interesting light on other areas of sensory perception by way ofanalogy even if the analogy is sometimes incorrect or exaggerated.3

The reader will observe that in many of the explorations of the phenomenon ofsound, the analysis is undertaken by comparison of sound with other phenomena,such as light, water waves, or scent. Sometimes Leonardo evidently had plannedsuch chains of analogies before confiding his formulation to paper. At other timesthe analogy, or analogies, came to his mind as an afterthought. It looks as if his

curious mind could not detach itself from an observation without the question: If thiswas true, how is it with other seemingly similar phenomena or senses or media? Dothey behave according to identical rules, or at least similar or in some way comPara-

ble laws?Apparently obsessed by the initial observation, he may overdo and exaggerate

the comparison. One example of this is the drawing which consists of a whole chain

of sketches that illustrate similar types of behavior of nature: light, the force of ablow, sound, magnetic force, and odor.

Because analogies permeate his writings it may be appropriate to show theirscope and character by a few striking examples. I will quote three examples showingsound as a phenomenon in air compared with other phenomena occurring andfading in air, such as smell, and with phenomena in other media, such as water, and

also the spread of light.

obviously urged to react to exciting observations by trying to create functional objects, gadgets,

machines, or mechanisms that immediately embody and, as it were, crystallize his sensual experienceinto something functional. It is characteristic that in his study of the flight of birds, he constructed many

different and elaborate flying machines long before he intensified his initial observations of flying birdsby the systematic study of their many varieties and phases, and recorded these observations in count-less small sketches and explanatory remarks in his precious little volume on the "Volo degli uccelli-" InF 4r v, he contemplated the subject in four sections: (r) the nature and resistance of air; (z) the anatomy

of the bird and its feathers; (3) the action of the feathers in the movement of flight; and (4) the behavior

of tail and wings in flying with the wind.3. Some of these-ideas have been analyzed by G. Panconcelli-Calzia in his original and

interesiing bo ok Leonardo als Phonetiker (Hamburg: Hansischer Gildenverlag Joachim Heitm ann, t943) ,

which, however, has no bearing on music itself or on Leonardo as a musician.

RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS

r. CA 27o ac:

A programmatic statement begins with the sun as the center of our hemisphere anddiscusses "how there are images of its form in all the parts where it reveals itself, andyou see how in all these same places, there are also the images of its radiance, and tothese must also be added the image of the power of its heat; and all these powersproceed from the same source by means of radiant lines which issue from its bodyand end in the opaque objects without it thereby undergoing any diminution."

Later on the same page the question of diminution, that is, the diminution ofthe substance of the body, is tranferred to the medium of air by asking: What will thepeople say of musk, which always keeps a great quantity of the atmosphere chargedwith its odor, and which, if it be carried a thousand miles, will permeate a thousandmiles with that thickness of atmosphere without any diminution of itself?a

z. CA r z6 ra:

Here, Leonardo compares the behavior of several spreading or rebounding media orforces, such as a hammer-blow, light, sound, magnetic attraction, and smell, in arow of nine neat drawings (illus. 7.r). Three of them concern sound: the penetrationof a wall; the penetration of a hole in a wall; and echo. The explanatory text on the leftof each of these drawings runs as follows:

r. figura-Come le linie, o ver razzi luminosi, non passan se non corpi diafani.z. figura-Come la basa [ruiv] x o, sendo allumata dal punto p, genera u[na] piramida

che fini[ch] sce nel punto c, e ricausane un'altra basa in r S, e so[ss]tto sopra riceve cio che e inxo.

3. figura-Come 'l punto e cagione della basa, e metti un vetro colorito dinanzi a ciacunlume, e vedrai Ia basa tinta in quello.

4. figura-Come le linie del colpo passa ogni muro.

5. figura-Come trovando un foro, li si causa molte linie, piu debole ciacuna che laprima.

6. figura-La boce d'eco.

7. figura-Come le linie della calamita e quelle del ferro si passan il muro, ma quel ch' e

piu leggieri e tirato dal piu grave.8. figura-Sendo di pari peso, la calamita e'l ferro si tirano a un modo.

9. figura-L'odore fa quel medesimo che'1 colpo.

r. How the lines, or rather the rays of light go only through transparent bodies.z. How the basis XO, when illuminated from p. creates a pyramid that ends at c. and

results in another basis at r S, and conversely receives what is marked XO.

3. How the point produces the base; place a colored glass before each light and you willsee the base colored by it.

4. How the lines of the blow penetrate every wall.

5. How, when it finds a hole, it causes many lines, each weaker than the first.6. The voice of echo.

4. Not the loss of substance of an aromatic body, but the mathematical rules of fading sound-or, rather, the perspective of sound-is parallelled without any verbal explanation but merely by a

suggestive drawing of fragrant flowers in L 8o r (p. rz6).

99

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'^'[LJ "-J$-p.$-rr o-,-;i.& *\-*' -r \-) -r'(-"' **t$^e--L.,,'r-.6,$d.g-d +irY'"(*l 1

**'/*,*ri *$;r:-'$4P"\ i)-T*^ r', &i

, .., ' , ,,...r,1..

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1' I It

7.r. Set of 9 schematic drawings illustrating the behavior of light, the forcemagnetism. Detail from CArz6ra.

of a blow, sound, and

RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS 101

7. How the lines of a magnet and those of the iron penetrate the wall, but the lighter ofthe two is attracted by the heavier.

8. If of equal might, the magnet and the iron attract each other equally.9. Smell behaves like blow.

j.A6or:

This very long paragraph begins with a question in the title and is followed by acomparison of two media, air and water:

What Causes the Eddies of WaterA11 the movements of the wind resemble those of the water.

Then in A 6r r the analysis of complex movements of water continues with thetitle:

The Eddies at the Bottom of Water Move in anOpposite Direction to Those Above

The reason of this is that, if the circles which above are large become reduced to a pointas they are submerged, and then continue their movement in the direction in which it began,the water will at the bottom make a movement contrary to that above when it separates itselffrom its center.

Then again the imaginative leap to another medium occurs, from water to air:

Although the sounds which traverse the air proceed from their sources by circularmovements, nevertheless the circles which are propelled by their different motive powersmeet together without any hindrance and penetrate and pass across one another, keepingalways their causes as their centers. [MacCurdy, vol. z, p. z8]

Since, in all cases of movement, water has great conformity with qir,I will offer it as anexample of the above-mentioned proposition.

Here Leonardo neglects to say expressly that sound, unlike the circular two-dimensional eddies in water, spreads in space three dimensionally in all directions(that is, in the form of a sphere), but he returns to the analysis of water evidently fordidactic or illustrative reasons: water movements, different from sound and air, arevisible and therefore easier to follow.

7.2. Concentric circles in waterDetail from A 6r r.

Then Leonardo tums to a detailed description of the intersection of two con-centric circles in water caused by two pebbles (illus. 7.2):

I say that, if at the same time you throw two small stones into a large lake of still water at acertain distance one from another, you will observe two distinct sets of circles form round the

ao2 RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS

two points where they have struck; and as these sets of circles grow larger they come to meettogether and the circles intersect one with another, always keeping as their centres the spotswhich were struck by the stones. The reason of this is that although some show of movementmay be visible there, the water does not depart from its place because the openings madethere by the stones are instantly closed; and the movement occasioned by the suddenopening and closing of the water makes a certain shaking which one would define as aquivering rather than a movement. That what I say may be more evident to you, just considerthose pieces of straw which on account of their lightness float on the surface of the water andare not moved from their position by the wave that rolls beneath them as the circles widen.This disturbance of the water, therefore, being a quivering rather than a movement, thecircles cannot break one another as they meet, for, as all the parts of water are of a likesubstance, it follows that these parts transmit the quivering from one to another withoutchanging their place, for, as the water remains in its position, it can easily take this quiveringfrom the parts near to it and pass it on to other parts near to it, its force meanrvhile steadilydecreasing until the end.s

It is highly characteristic that Leonardo's interest is not restricted to the phe-nomenon of smooth interference of the circles and their intersection. He is interestedin keeping distinct two forms of movement: one, the advance and intersection of thecircles; and the other, which he defines as a "quiverirtg" (tremor) in connection witha similarly trembling but not advancing straw. It is clear to him that the individualwater molecules forming the circular rings and shaking the straw cause do not parfici-pate in the actual movement of the constantly expanding circular waves; they justpush their neighbor molecules, communicating the tremor to them. It is also clearthat Leonardo applies per analogiam this observation of water to the explanationof the spread of sound in air as a combination of longitudinal and transversalwaves (to use modern terms), anticipating much later developments in acousticaltheory.6

The great classical treatise of Helmholtz, Lehre zson den Tonempfindungen(Heidelberg, 186z), contains a very similar description of these phenomena. The listof contents in his book simply says: "General characteristics of wave movements;while the waves advance continuously the particles of the medium through whichthey advance perform periodical movements." Because Helmholtz's whole book isdevoted to the exploration of invisible phenomena such as sound, he, like Leonardo,found it practical to give the illustrative comparison with the circular water waves.He emphasized that "the occurrence in the air is essentially the same as that on thewater surface, the basic difference being only that sound in the ocean of air extendedin space expands in all directions as in a sphere, whereas waves on the surface ofwater can only advance in the form of rings."

5. English translation here by Edward MacCurdy, The Notebooks ot' Leonardo da Vinci (London:

Jonathan Cape, ry38), vol. z, p. 28. For Richter's version in modern Italian (]. P. Richter, The LiteraryWorks of Leonardo daVinci [London: Oxford University Press, 1939), vol. z, p. 4z), see Appendix below.

5. To my knowledge it has not been observed how original some of Leonardo's observations inthe field of acoustics have been. Y . P. Zubov' s highly original book, Leonardo da Vinci (Cambridge:Harvard University Press, 1968), examining Leonardo as a scientist, omits acoustics entirely; there arenot even entries in the index on "acoustics," or subjects such as " ear," "heaing," "sound, " "voice," or"echo," while Leonardo's ideas about the various meanings of harmony are discussed, pp. 258 tt.


Helmholtz does not reveal the source of the origin of his observations. Couldhe have read Leonardo? This is extremely improbable. The earliest systematic publi-cation of Leonardo's codices did not begin before the end of the nineteenth."itr.y,except for ll Trattato del Moto e Misura dell' Acqua (Bologna, rgzg).

What about a common source? One recalls Vitruvius's ten books, De Architec-tura, and the chapter on the acoustics of the theater, in which he felt obliged to dealwith the problems of echo and sound in general. The work was publishedin Rome in1486 and soon after in Venice and Como. There is little doubt that Leonardo hadaccess to it.7 He refers to Vitmvius repeatedly in his notebooks, for instance, in G 96 rconceming methods to measure distance through the revolutions of carriagewheels; the proportions of augers (L fir_53v); the proportions of the limbs of adultsand children (TP ro8, tz5, rz6, t36); in one quick note (K rc9 v), Leonardo remindshimself of the address of a gentleman who possesses "a vitruvius.,,

Vitruvius, in chapter 3 of his book V, entitled De theatro ejusque salubri con-stitutione, deals with the acoustical requirements of theater rooms and continues:

Etiam diligenter est animadvertendum ne sit locus surdus, sed ut in eo vox quam clarissimevagari possit. Hoc vero fieri ita poterit, si locus electus fuerit, ubi non impediatur resonantia.

Then follows a sentence of lapidary brevity, forming a bridge toward a theory of theexpansion of sound: "Vox autem ut spiritus fluens aeris, et actu sensibilis auditu[Now the voice is like a flon'ing breath of air, and is actual when perceived by thesense of hearingl." This is immediately illustrated by the compariion (,,uti si,;) be-tween the propigation of waves in w,aier and of sound.s

7. On Leonardo's knowledge of Latin, especially in texts of science, see ibid., pp. 42, 43, andAugusto Marinoni, "Leonardo's Literarv Legacv, " tn The llnknown Leonardo (New yorki McGraw-Hill,a974, pp. 6Z-6g, Zs-ZZ.

8. Vitruaius on Architecture, edited from the Harleian MS 2767 and translated into English byFrank Granger (London: Heinemann; and Nerv york: putnam,

ry3a), vol. r, pp. 266_69:

Ea movetur circulorum rutundationibus infinitis, uti si in stantem aquam lapide inmisso nascanturinnumerabiles undarum circuli crescentes a centro, quam latissime poisint, efvagantes, nisi angustialoci interpellaverit aut aliqua offensio, quae non patitur designationes earum undarum ad exituspervenire. Itaque cum interpellentur offensionibus, primae redundantes insequentium disturbantdesignationes' Eadem ratione vox ita ad circinum efficit motiones; sed in aqua circuli planitiae inlatitudine moventur, vox et in latitudine progredjtur et aititudinem gradatim scindit. Igitur ut in aquaundarum designationibus, item in voce cum offensio nulla primam undam interpelliverit, non dis-turbat secundam nec insequentes, sed omnes sine resonantia perveniunt ad imorum et ad summorumaures. Ergo veteres architecti naturae vestigia persecuti indagationibus vocis scandentis theatrorumperfecerunt gradationes, et quaesierunt per canonicam mathematicorum et musicam rationem, ut,quaecumque vox esset in scaena, clarior et suavior ad spectatorum perveniret aures. Uti enim organain aeneis lamminis aut corneis echeis ad cordarum sonitum claritatem perficiuntur, sic theatrorumper harmonicen ad augendam vocem ratiocinationes ab antiquis sunt constitutae.

It is moved along innumerable undulations of circles; as when we throw a stone into standing water.Innumerable circular undulations arise spreading from the centre as wide as possible. And theiextendunless the limited space hinders, or some obstruction which does not allow the directions of the wuresto reach the outlets. And so when they are interrupted by obstacles, the first waves flowing backdisturb the directions of those which follow. In the same way the voice in like manner moves- circlefashion. But while in water the circles move horizontatly only, the voice both moves horizontally andrises vertically by stages. Therefore as is the case with the direction of the waves in water, so with thevoice when no obstacle interrupts the first wave, this in turn does not disturb the second and later

to3


The conception that the expanding circular waves on the water surface repre-sent only a section of the sphere in which sound waves spread was clear to Vitruvius:". . . in aqua circuli aqua planicie in latitudenem moventur: vox in latitudenem prog-reditur, & altitudinem gradatim scandit. . . [In water the surface rings move inbreadth: sound progresses in breadth, and gradually rises in height . . .)."

But Leonardo's thoughts on the circular propagation of waves in water and inair exceed those of Helmholtz andVitruvius. He introduced one more analogy in theCodice Atlantico: the parallel with light.e

In CA to8 va, he sums up his theory in general form: "The mol'ements of waterwithin water proceed like those of air withirt air."

Here one must relate separate statements to one another: CA ro8 va, CA 9 v,and CA 347 ru.

One word at least should be said here about Leonardo's choice of expressions forvarious kinds of sounds. He is not entirely consistent, but in general he distin-guishes expressions for sounds with definite pitch and others without. To the firstgroup belong uoce, sonot and tono, which could approximately be translated by"voice," "sound," and "tone." To the second grouP belong words such as strepido

and romore, translatable, respectively, as "toar," "blast," or "boom," and "din" or

"noise." A differentiation between the two seems suggested by A 5z t"' strepido as a

very loud, sudden, explosive noise, for instance, caused by large mortars (bombarde),

while romore stands for a somewhat less violent, longer-lasting loud sound.

A5za:

Dello strepido

-iltono della bonbarda tratto verso lacqua amazera. tutti lianimali chessi troverano. inessa.

acqua

The tone of the bombard directed against water kills all animals that find themselves in the

water.

waves, but all reach the ears of the top and bottom rows without echoing. Therefore the ancientarchitects following nature's footsteps, traced the voice as it rose, and carried out the ascent of the

theatre seats. By the rules of mathematics and the method of music, they sought to make the voices

from the stage rise more clearly and sweetly to the spectator's ears. For just as organs which have

bronze plates or horn sounding boards are brought to the clear sound of string instruments, so bythe arrangement of theatres in accordance with the science of harmony, the ancients increased the

power of the voice.

9. Leonardo has been credited with the invention of the wave theory of light, analogous

to the transverse wave motion in water, by Domenico Argentieri in the chapter on Leonardo's optics,

which he contributed to the volume Leonardo da Vinci (New York: Reynal & Co., tg56), PP.4o5 ff. Ananalysis of his opinion would require the comparative study of the many dilferent concepts ofLeonardo of the images of all objects spread out in luminous air to be perceived by eyes, in several of thecodices, especially CA zTovc ("Every body fills all the surrounding air with its image"), and CA 345vb.Such a study is beyond the limits of the present chapter on Leonardo's interest in acoustics. Seneca,

Natural Questions :r2.2, corrrpates the widening circles in water directly with light: "All light is round,"but omits the analogy with sound.

ro5

I

I

i


Del romore

-settorai uno vaseletto oaltro vasoresonate. e choverchia choncharta vitellina. bagniata epoi

chesecha ficha vna chordetta incierata inquesto modo ettira chon guanto incierato di pochapegola evldirai strano more [romore]

If you take a little vessel or another resonant receptacle and cover it with soaked calfskin, andif it is later equipped with a small waxed cord, and if you pull it with a glove coated with alittle tar, it will produce a strange "romore."

This is a neat and exact description of the shrieking friction drum playedtraditionally at the Piedigrotta festival in Naples, and known also in the Netherlandsas Rommelpot, in Germany as Brummtopf $ Waldteufel, and in France as Cri de labelle-mbre. About its many other omomatopoetic names, see H. Balfour , The FrictionDrum.ro

We also quote here part of a long and detailed description in Triv. 18 v (Tavola44a), full of descriptions of the sensations of loud sound:

The Nature of the Effect of the Roar of the Mortar fBombarda]:The rumblin glromore) of the mortar is caused by the impetuous fury of the flame beaten

back by the resisting air, and that quantity of the powder causes this effect because it findsitself ignited within the body of the mortar; and not perceiving itself in a place that hascapacity for it to increase, nature guides it to search with fury a place suitable for its increase,and breaking or driving before it the n'eaker obstacle it wins its way into spacious air; and thisnot being capable of escaping u'ith the speed with which it is attacked, because the fire ismore volatile than the air, it follon s that as the air is not equally volatile with the fire it cannotmake way for it with that velocity and srviftness with which the fire assails it, and therefore ithappens that there is resistance, and the resistance is the cause of a great roar and rumblingof the mortars lgrande strepido delle bombardel.

But if the mortar were to be moved against the oncoming of an impetuous wind itwould be the occasion of a greater roar lmagiore tronito) made by reason of the greaterresistance of the air against the flame, and so it u,ould make less rumbling fminore romore)when moved in the line of the wind because there would then be less resistance.

In marshy places or other wide tracts of air the mortar will make a louder report fmagioreromoref close at hand. . . ."

ro. (London, rgro). For further discussion of the Rommelpot, see p. r83.


ORIGIN OF SOUND

Celestinl Harmony: F 56 a

Whether the friction of the heavens makes a sound or no:Every sound is caused by the air striking a dense body, and if it is made by two heavy

bodies one with another it is by means of the air that surrounds them; and this friction wearsaway the bodies that are rubbed. It would follow therefore that the heavens in their frictionnot having air between them would not produce sound. Had however this friction reallyexisted, in the many centuries that these heavens have revolved they would have beenconsumed by their own immense speed of every day. And if they made a sound it would notbe able to spread, because the sound of the percussion made underneath the water is butlittle heard and it would be heard even less or not at all in the case of dense bodies. Further inthe case of smooth bodies the friction does not create sound, and it would happen in a similarmanner that there would be no sound in the contact or friction of the heavens. And if theseheavens are not smooth at the contact of their friction it follows that they are full of iumps andrough, and therefore their contact is not continuous, and if this is the case the vacuum isproduced, which it has been concluded does not exist in nature. We arrive therefore at theconclusion that the friction would have rubbed away the boundaries of each heaven, and inproportion as its movement is swifter towards the centre than towards the poles it would bemore consumed in the centre than at the poles; and then there would not be friction anymore, and the sound would cease, and the dancers would stop, except that the heavens wereturning one to the east and the other to the north.11

CA 267 ra:

In this long passage there are drawings of models for experimentation, with propor-tion numbers added to them. Leonardo continues: "In these two rules, that is, of theblow and the force, one may employ the proportions which Pictagoras [slc] used inhismusic."Leonardo, inquotingPythagoras, sometimesuses "PTtagora'' andsome-times "Pictaghora" or "Pictagora-" Could we assume that by this playful transfor-mation of the great magician's and musician's name, Leonardo welcomed him across2,ooo years into the company of pictorial pioneers, heirs, and masters of the princi-ples of proportion theory?

Leonardo here evidently refers to the Pythagorean doctrine of the harmony ofthe spheres, well known in the Italian Renaissance, above all through the "Dream ofScipio" in Cicero's De Republica, book VI, which through many copies, prints, andcomments had become one of the most famous and influential treatises of the Re-naissance.l2

rr. MacCurdy, vol. r, p. 299.rz. On the influence of the doctrine of the harmony of the spheres on Filippino Lippi's Cappella

Strozzi, see Emanuel Winternitz, "Muses & Music in a Burial Chapel: An Interpretation of FilippinoLippi's Window Wall in the Cappella Strozzi," in Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischm Institutes in Florenz,vol.XI(1965)no.4,and,MusicallnstrumentsandTheirSymbolisminWestemArt,zded.(NewHaven: YaleUniversity Press, 1979).

,a-:1&- *.}*


A Blow on a Hard Resonant Object: A 8 r

In A 8 r (illus. 7.3)Leonardo makes a tabulation of various blows or percussionsupon materials of different hardness or softness. He lists 14 cases, each describedwith a line or two of text, and to the right of each, diagrams of which the fifth fromthe top shows a bell hit by a ball and the angle by which the ball is deflected.Leonardo's caption to this fifth diagram reads: "cholpo in resonante obbiecto [theblow on a resounding objectl."

The Time Consumedby a Blow: C 6 o

An interesting examination of the time needed by the blow to produce sound ismade in C 5 v (illus. 7.4):

7.4. Sketch of a bell hit by a hammer ac-companying the text. Detail fromC6v.

Of the sound made by percussion:However near to the ear a sound is produced, the eye would see the blow first. Reason:

if we admit that the time of the blow is indivisible, that the nature of the blow does notproduce without time its impact upon the body that has been struck, that no body struck cansound while the thing that has struck is touching it, and that the sound cannot travel from thestruck body to the ear without time, then you must admit that the thing which strikes isseparated and divided from the thing struck before this thing struck can itself producesoundi and not producing it, it cannot convey it to the ear."13

Duration of a Blow-Suspended and Nonsuspended Objects: Tria. j6 r (Taaola 64 a) andTria. 4j r (Taaola 7j a)

In Triv. 36 r (Tavola 64 a) Leonardo examines the duration of a blow, the vibration ofsuspended and nonsuspended objects, and the question of whether the tone is inthe hammer or anvil.

What is sound made by the blow?The time in which a blow is produced is the shortest thing that can be achieved by man,

and no object is so large that when suspended it would not react to a blow by an instantmovement; this movement shakes the air, and the air begins to sound as soon as it touchesthe vibrating object. [Adapted from MacCurdy, vol. r, p. z8z)

Whether sound lies in the hammer or in the anvil:I say that an anvil not suspended in air cannot resound; it is the hammer that resounds

13. This is a much corrected version of MacCurdy's translation (vol. r, p. 28il.


in rebounding after the blow, and if the anvil were to echo the sound made on it by everysmall hammer, as the bell does when every different thing which strikes it with the samedepth of tone (pitch); but since you hear different notes with hammers of different sizes, itfollows that the note is in the hammer and not in the anvil.

Why an object that is not suspended does not sound, and when suspended every slightcontact removes the sound from it: the bell when struck makes a sudden tremor and thistremor causes it to strike the surrounding air which instantly resounds. If the bell is pre-vented by any slight contact (damped) it does not make the tremor or the strike, and so the airdoes not resound.la [Adapted from MacCurdy, vol. r, p. z8z]

In partial contradiction to the statement quoted above from Triv. 36 r (Tavola64 a) is another observation in Triv. 43 r (Tavol a 73 a): "The blow given on the thickobject will keep its sound longer than on a thin object, and that will be of longestduration which is made upon an object that is suspended and thin." But Leonardo'seager mind did not Pause to clarify the contradiction but hurries on to one of hisbeloved heuristic analogies, this time with the phenomenon of light: "The eye keepswithin itself the images of luminous objects for a certain interval of time" (transla-tion by MacCurdy [vol. r, pp. z8z-83], who uses number TR 73 r).

Dust and Tone Eigures: F 6 r r

As a musician, Leonardo was naturally occupied with the factors that determinemusical pitch, and he experimented ivith vases of different shapes and apertures.Although he could not foresee its implications, another of his observations hadmusical importance. When he struck a table with a hammer, small heaps of dust ofgeometric patterns formed on its surface:

Of the local movements of movable arid [particles of dry matter], that is, dust andsmaller [onesi, I say that if a table is struck along diverse lines, the dust llyingJ on it concen-trates [or organizesl in various shapes of hills and small mountains, and this originatesfrom. . .

The dust which divides itself into various mountains on the struck table descends fromthe hypotenuse of these mountains, enters under their bases and rises again around the axisof the region under the top of the mountain, and so moves with the movement of theorthogonal trianglels-and this originates from . . .

And when the dusty table is struck on one side, notice the manner in which the motionof the dust begins towards the creation of the mentioned mountains and in which mannerthe dust rises towards the mountain top.

The axis of the angle of incidence. . . ends over the corpuscles by a vertical line, bywhatever aspect all around[?]-

r4' See comments on CA 267 rafor an application of the musical proportions "used by pictagora"to the rules of the blow and the force (p. ro6). For Leonardo's deliberaielypeculiar Italian, see Appen-olx.

r5. The French translation radically misunderstands Leonardo's observation by changingLeonardo's orthogonal triangle "triangolo ortogonio," a triangle with a right angle, in'to "triangleoctogon," an octagonal triangle, although Leonardo's reference to "hypotenuse" suggested the right-angle triangle.

aog


Describe the mountains of flexible arids [particles of dry matter], that is, the creation ofthe waves of sand carried by the wind and the creation of their mountains and hills as ithappens in Libya, you will see an example of it on the large sand stretches of the Po and of theTicino and other great rivers.

This is an extraordinary observation of Leonardo, as overwhelmed by thenovelty of his idea, he puts it down in jerks, beginning several sentences over againand not finishing them.

It is unfortunate that of the two translations into English of this page, Richterand MacCurdy, each concentrates on a different section of Leonardo's statement.MacCurdy is interested only in the behavior of moving dust, and the experimentwith a table that is covered with dust and struck, organizing the dust uPon it intoregular little mountains.l6 Richter, translating movable dust with "shifting deserts"and "the formation of wind-shifted waves of sand," is interested in the origin ofgeological formations.lT Hereby both miss the comprehension of Leonardo's basic

idea reaching from a small experiment with dust organized into geometrical figuresby hammer strokes on a table, to a question of cosmogony, resulting in one of themost striking among his many analogies. One could entitle it: "A little home experi-ment for exploring the creation of the LIniverse."

Leonardo's discovery must have had special significance for him since it con-

stituted an easily observable correspondence between the auditory and the visualrealms.

16. MacCurdy, vol. t, p. 559.17. Richter, vol. z, p. zo7.

ooo96soaffiol@ffiffi@@1mffiffiffi@i@@ffiffi#l@#ffiffi@

7.5. Klangfiguren from Chladni

RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS A11

It is not generally known that this experimentation with dust on a struck tableanticipated by three hundred years a discovery by the famous physicist and creatorof experimental acoustics, Ernst Florens Friedrich Chladni. Chladni was born inq56in Wittenberg and died in t8z7 rnBreslau. Famous for his treatise on acoustics, in hisEntdeckungen ilber die Theorie des Klanges $78) he described the discovery of"Klangfiguren" (tone figures): sand distributed on the surface of flexible platesforms into geometrical figures if the plate is hit or set into vibration by a fiddle bow(illus. 7.5).

Spirits Haae No Voice: B 4 a

At times Leonardo's meditations on sound tempt him to enter surrealistic, if notmagical, territories: If corporeal things can exert blows and therefore producesounds, how can disembodied or spectral spirits communicate?

In B 4 v, Leonardo states:

There can be no voice where there is no movement or no percussion of air; one cannothave percussion of the air when there is no instrument [tool]; but an instrument cannot beincorporeal. Therefore, a spirit cannot have either voice or form or force; if it assumes a

[material] body, it will not be capable of penetrating or entering where the doors are locked. 18

PITCH

Entries in many notebooks made at different times show that Leonardo made manyexperiments to study the effect of various factors upon pitch. Putting them to-gether, one admires the encyclopedic intention:

a. effect of size or volume of the vibrating bodyb. effect of size of vibrating wingsc. effect of length and width of pipesd. effect of shape of vessele. effect of speed of air streamThe contraction of trachea rings belongs to the physiology of voice produc-

tion.

a. Effect of size or aolume of the aibrating body: Forster lll 5 r

If you make two bells of the same proportion but one of the same weight but double size, thebigger one will be twice as low in pitch.

18. In general, Leonardo's opinion of the corporeality of spirits can perhaps best be seen inWindsorAN.Brgo4Sr(B3rr)andthecommentstothesestatementsinZubov, LeonardodaVinci,p.96.


b. Effect of size of aibrating wings: Windsor AN. B. rgo32 a (B r 5 a)

The sound made by flies originates in their wings and you will see this by cutting them a littleor, even better, by smearing them a little with honey in such away as not entirely to preventthem from flying, and you will see that the sound made by the movement of the wings willbecome hoarse and the pitch will change from high to deep in proportion to the diminution ofthe free use of the wings. [MacCurdy, vol. r, p. 288]

c. Effect of the length of pipes: Quaderni d'Anatomia lV to r

You should describe and illustrate how the varying, modulating, and articulating of thesinging voice is a simple function of the rings of the trachea,le which are moved by thereversive neryes. In this the tongue is not used.

And this remains proved by what I have proved before, that the pipes of the organ donot become lower or higher in pitch by changing the fistula (that is, the place u.here the voiceis produced) in making it wider or narrower, but only by the change of the pipe itself inmaking it wider or narrower or longer or shorter, as one sees in the extension or retraction ofthe trombone ["astensione o ractractione della tronba torta"].

MacCurdy's translation (vol. t, p. t84), "expansion or compression of thewinding trumpet," is misleading. Leonardo clearly means a slide instrument ofwhich part of the tubing can be extended and retracted. Likewise, the word windingis misleading: Leonardo meant by torta not large, round coils as in the baroquehunting hom but small coils that permit folding back into parallel tubes to usetelescopic sliding. Since I could not use a literal translation such as "slide trumpet"[the slide trumpet did not exist in Leonardo's time], I used "trombone ," the familiarsliding instrument of his duy.,o

Resuming the quotation of Leonardo's text:

Furthermore, in a pipe unchangeable in width and length, the sound is varied by introducingthe air with more or less force, and this change happens not in the objects which are struckwith major or minor impact, as one perceives with the bells hit by smallest or biggest beaters,and the same happens with guns larteleriel similar in width and different in length; but herethe shortest makes a louder and lower noise than the longer one, and on this I will not lingersince I have treated this in my book on musical instruments ["nel libro dellj strumentiarmonjcj ne ho trattato assai chopiosameflte"l.zr

d. Et'fect of the shape of the aessel: L 6j rWhy will the sounding vessel with a smaller mouth have in its percussion a much deeper andlower sound than with a wider mouth? [translation by the author].

19. Here Leonardo, who was not familiar with the vocal cords, is apparently influenced by hisprofound knowledge of wind instruments. See entry e below.

zo. The slide trumpet (tromba da tirarsi) was not invented before the eighteenth century; theprinciple of the slide in the trombone can be traced back as far as the fifteenth century. See Adam Carse,Musical Winil lnstrumenfs (London , a91il, pp. 46 ff ., z5t .

zr. For a discussion of the book mentioned here, see the preface, above.

RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS AA3

[Perchd il vaso sonoro di minorbocca ar2r [probably "avta"f nella sua percussione moltapit grave e pii bassa voce colla sua bocca stretta che essendo larga.l

e. Effect of speed of air stream: E 4 a

Why the swift wind passing through a reed makes a high sound.The wind passing through the very same reed will make a sound so much lower or

higher in proportion to its slowness or swiftness. And this is seen in the changes of sounds

made by trumpets or horns without fingerholes and also in the winds which with their sound

penetrate the chinks of doors or windows. This sound originates in the air where the sound

emerging from the instrument fills the space and proceeds to spread more or less according

to the degree by which the air is pushed by a greater or lesser force. One can prove this.

fAdapted from MacCurdy, vol. t , p. 285. The last two sentences are freely translated to make

sense in English.l

PROPAGATION OF SOUND

Quaderni d'Anatomia lll rz a

I have provided (p. ror) a description of Leonardo's analysis of the intersection oftwo circles in the water caused by the impact of two pebbles (in A 6r r). An applica-tion of this experience is found in the behavior of water in Quademi d'Anatomia IIIrz v, which shows a simple but ingenious contraption for testing the expansion offragments of circular water waves as a model for the behavior of sound waves (illus.

7.6).

Go into a barque and construct the enclosure loutside the boat in the waterl m, n, o, p,

andputthereintwopiecesofboard, s,r,t,r;thencausethepercussion"a" andseewhetherthe broken wave with its segment reaches wp to "b, c. " And this experiment with the wavecut by the wave which is cut off from the [normal, full] circular wave lsee "a"l will make youunderstand the wave of air passing through a hole through which passes the human voice

enclosed in a box, as I have heard at Campi of somebody who was locked up in a keg open

only at the vent.

:l;r.'1.l'a..:11r1,_.1'11 rrt,l{Sj

t'.'"

j*8t..':,,'rr.i: -r.

:1&i:. i.,..:.t...:..1r' $

*-'a *tir;ll:*?i*&

: ,

l3!1tt, .:r:i-..$kS

7.6. Diagram of a contraption for testing the expansion of fragments of circular water waves as a

model for the behavior of sound waves. Quaderni d'Anatomia III rz v.

414 RESEARcH oN Acousrrcs

It is tempting to compare this sketch of Leonardo's with the famous "Young'sdiagram" published in r8or by the physicist Thomas young (illus .2.7), which showsthe behavior of concentric light waves passing through an aperture and divergingthere.

7.7. "Y oung's diagram."

CA rgg ab

The spread of sound, and especially of the human voice, is explored in cA ry9 vb(illus. 7.8):

7.8. Three diagrams accompanying thediscussion of the spread of sound.Detail, CA r99 vb.

Whether the whole circle forined by the sound of the human voice carries with it thewhole word spoken because part of the circle striking another man's ear does not leave in thatear a part of the word but the whole.

What we have said is clarified by light, and you would be able to say that if the light as a

whole illuminates the whole of the room because a part of this room would not be illumi-nated by only part of this light.

l\\\l-.;r'-,,\'i.;iF-X,"../.;. \,. 'r. )^1_.!)r'.;' ..j.\...r--:_i.-,...,_\.-'..<-*-J..,..'' f,-.1


If you wish to argue and to say that this light illuminates the room not as a whole butonly with its part, then I would explain that with one or two mirrors placed in differentlocations in the room, each part of the mirror will have in it the whole of the illuminationmentioned; thus this shows that the light is all in all and also all in each part of the room; andthis is also the case with the voice in its circle. [MacCurdy, vol. t, p. 279)

B6rThe spread of sound, not in air but in another medium, water, is treated in B 6 r:

If you cause your ship to stop, and place the head of a long tube in water, and place the

other extremity to your ear, you will hear ships at a great distance from you.You can also do the same thing by placing the head of a tube upon the ground, and you

will then hear anyone passing at a distance from you. [MacCurdy, vol. t, P. z8+]

REFRACTION OF SOUND: ECHO

Leonardo's thoughts on the phenomenon of refraction of sound present us with a

dilemma. Several longer statements each combine many observations, for instance,on the geometric implications of refraction such as the angle of rebounding, thespeed of echo, the effect of the various shapes of the wall causing the rebound, andothers. To split these complex descriptions and to recombine their content into listsof the various special problems would rob them of their freshness and repress the6lan so characteristic of Leonardo's panoramic curiosity and impatient energy.Thus, we will quote some of them unmutilated and then turn to examples of hisdiscussions of single problems in coherent groups.

CA zz ab

CAZZ vb (illus. 7.9) gives a description of unsurpassed conciseness, with hardly a

superfluous word in the Italian text (see Appendix), of the conduct of the sound ofecho in its varieties including even a case in which the ear is deceived about theactual origin of the echo.

The sound of the echo is continuous or discontinuous, single or accompanied, of briefor long duration, of finite or infinite tone, immediate or from far.

It is continuous when the surface where the echo is generated is uniformly curved. The

sound of the echo is discontinuous when the place where it is generated is irregular orinterrupted. It is single when it is generated in one spot only. It is accompanied when it isgenerated in several spots. It is brief or long when it circles or zig-zags in a struck bell, or in a

cistern or other hollow place, or in clouds in which the sound holds back in degrees of space

or of time, always regularly growing fainter and behaving like a circular, expanding wave inthe ocean.

Often one perceives the sound not from the place where it actually originates, but from

a phantom ["simulacro"]i such a thing happened at Ghiera d'Adda when a fire that took the

town produced in the air twelve phantom apparitions of sound ["toni"] in twelve clouds,

and one could not perceive the cause. [Adapted from MacCurdy, vol. a,P. 279)

415

7.9. "The Voice of the Echo." Detail, CA77 vb. i;

a' i:tY{a,ia$-4&3-e} .,-*, + - -

7.1o. Creating a chain of echoes.Detail, B 9o v.

Rebounding sound deceivingthe ear as to its origin. C z4 r.

RESEARCH oN ACoUSTICS aa7

B go a (lllus. 7, ro)

The sound emanating from the man and rebounding from the wall will escape upward. Ifthere will be a ledge above this wall with a right angle, the surface above will send the voiceback toward its origin.

How one could lead the sound of the echo, whatever you may say, so that it will berepeated to you in many voices.

r5o braccia from one wall to the other. The voice which issues from the horn takesshape at the opposite wall and rebounds from there to the first, as a ball that leaps betweentwo walls, which diminishes its leaps and therefore diminishes the sound itself. [Adaptedfrom MacCurdy, vol. t, p. 284)

[The sketch refers only to the last paragraph.]

To study and explain the functioning and phenomenon of echo, Leonardoconstructs with his pen a contraption consisting of two opposite stairs. The left hasfive, the right four steps; each step is covered by an overhanging ledge to catch thesound beneath it and prevent it from radiating upward. The effect is a chain ofechoes. If the horn player sitting at the foot of the right stairs sends the sound nearlyhorizontally toward the opposite stairs, directing it at the point beneath the thirdstep, the sound bounces back toward the point beneath the projecting ledge of thesecond step (from the top) and from there again toward the corresponding point ofthe opposite stairs, and so forth.

Cz4r

Leonardo often indulges in analogies between deceptive sensations received by theeye and by the ear. In the notes shown in illustrationT.al., chiefly on visual matters,there is an insert in smaller handwriting concerning an acoustical problem. He wroteall the notes, as he so often did, from right to left. It may be that the remark on echowith the small diagram was inserted later when the analogy occurred to Leonardo(see Appendix for Leonardo's Italian).

Among bodies of similar kind and equally distant from the eye, that one which appearsof smaller shape is the one that is surrounded by a field of great luminosity.

The stroke delivered at "n" appears to the ear, "f," us [if] delivered in "s,"Every visible body is surrounded by light and shade. A body of uniform roundness

which is surrounded by light and shade appears to have one of its regions larger than anotherif it is more strongly illuminated.

CSo(illus.Z.rz)

SoundIf the sound is in "m" and the listener in "n," the sound will be believed to be in "s" if

the court is enclosed at least on 3 sides against the listener.

[VoceSe la voce fia in "m," e'l uditore d'essa sia in " n" essa voce liparira in " s" se'l chortile

sara serato ilmeno da 3 bande diveso esso ulditore.l

. r.... ! . ':rr r..,.; ,i.::r,...,i).,.:rr , {. i..a

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" ,',.., t:,lli,_..r',. ,..* j' ..,."..'t..L,'..,

7.r2. Ear of the listener deceived by a rebounded sound. Detail, C 5 v.

7.13. Reflection of an object by a mirror comparable to the rebounding of sound bv a wall. Detail, A r9 v.

'., .#lr^)."i"g'p"'-.ip,iP!P'"P

7. 14. Explanation of the rebounding of a

ball and of the human voice from a

wall at certain angles. Detail, A r9 r

7.45 Diagram of the impact of the soundof a bell toward a wall and reflectedfrom there to the ear. C 16 r.


Atgzt,Atgr,andC16r

aa9

Among the observations of and experiments with echo, analogies between seeingand hearing again play a great role.

One tempting although not quite exact comparison is stated in A 19 v. To avoidtranslating literally Leonardo's rather long-winded and repetitious presentation, itmay be simply stated that the comparison is between the reflection of an object by amirror and the rebounding of sound by a wall, together with an examination of theangles by which light and sound are refracted.

In the diagram accomPanying the text (illus. 7.q), a-b means the mirror. Just asc sees all parts of the mirror, so all parts of the mirror see c; therefore c is wholly in allof the mirrorbecause it is in all its parts; but it is also wholly in all parts because it canbe seen from that many different parts according to the different locations of theobserver. If an object, c, is seen at point n on line a-b, italso seems to be inside in thesame measure that it is outside; one will therefore see c in d; if the observer stands atf andlooks at d, he sees it in a straight line at point e of the mirror; if he stands at z,he will see the object d at t.

Let us take as an example the sun, which, if you walk along the bank of a river and seethe sun mirrored in it for so long as you walk along the bank of this river, it will seem that thesun walks with you and this is because the sun is all in the whole, and all in the part.[MacCurdy, vol. r, p.2U]

These explanations of refraction by Leonardo have to be considered togetherwith his statements in A r9 r (illus. 7.r4) and C 16 r (illus. 7.r5).

A 19 r: The line of the impact and its response are between equal angles.Each impact inflicted upon the object leaps back in an angle similar to that of the impact.The proposition appears clearly; in effect, if vou hit a wall with a ball it will leap back by anangle similar to that of the impact, that is, if the ball b is thrown at c it turns back on the line c-bbecause it is forced to leave the wall /-g at equal angles [slc]; and if you throw it on the line b-dit will turn back along the line d-e, and so the line of the impact and the line of the leap backform an angle with the wall fg located between the two equal angles as it appears betweenm-n. Therefore if one stays in b and shouts, the voice is wholly in the whole and throughoutthe whole length of the line f-g; thus the one standing as I have said in b and shouting willbelieve to hear his voice in c and that it returns to his ear along the line c-b , and at the sametime to somebody who find himself in e it will appear that he hears the voice & in the place dand coming over the line d-e.

C]6r: The voice of the echo, I say, is reflected from the percussion toward the ear, justas percussions22 made upon the mirrors by all kinds of objects are reflected to the eye; and asthe image falls from the object upon the mirror, and from there upon the eye by equal angles,so sound will fall and bounce back from the original concussion to the concavity23 and to theear.

zz. Leonardo uses percussione here in a wider sense, which could perhaps be translated by"impact," a term applicable to the visual field as well as to the audible.

23. MacCurdy translates as "within the hollow"; see the small projecting edge on top of the wallin the illustration.


RE S ONANCE

The problem of resonance is touched upon by Leonardo in two passages:

MS zq7 Bib. Nat. r r: (illus. 7.16)

If you wish to find out where a mine runs, set a drum over all the places where you suspectthe mine is being made and on this drum set a pair of dice, and when you are near the placewhere the mining is, the dice will jump up a little on the drum through the blow givenunderground in digging out the earth. [Richter, vol. z, p. zz9)

A zz a2a

A stroke on a bell will cause a response and move somewhat another bell similar to the firstone, and the string of a lute when played will cause a response and move another string ofsimilar sound2s in another lute, and this you will see if you place a straw on the string similarto the one that is played.

To Leonardo, the virtuoso on the lira da braccio, the phenomenon of resonance(or sympathetic vibration) must have been very familiar because of the open stringson his instrument.

VOLUME AND FADING OF SOUND

Trio. 7 a

It may be hetpful to begin a presentation of Leonardo's thoughts on the volume ofsound and fading with his significant observation, in Triv. 7 v (Tavola rza), that smalland large sounds are not simply small or large but have to be judged with resPect tothe distance they have traveled:

I ask whether a small sound from near can seem as loud as one large sound from far.

[translation by the author]

Domando. sel romore picholo. dapresso. po . parere . grande quanto. vno . grande '

dallontano

As a sought-after technical adviser on artillery and especially as the militaryengineer for Cesare Borgia, Leonardo was familiar with all aspects of firearms,including, of course, the acoustical aspects of firing cannons, particularly the effect

of the length of the gun on the volume of the sound produced and the impact of theatmosphere, misty or clear, on the loudness.

24. This is only one paragraph in A zz v; other statements on this page refer to the phenomenonof the afterimage.

25. Leonardo says simileaoce. Richter (vol. z, p. 4r) translates this as "voice" and MacCurdy (vol.

t, p. 284) as "tone." A free but probably most congenial translation would be "pitch."

7.16. Drum used as acoustical detective. Detail, MS zo37Bib. Nat. I r

$,.

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2.t7. Short mortar. CA 9 ra.


I 8S Gil r (illus. Z.rZ ICA g ral)

"Why the short mortar makes a louder explosion when fired than a long one, as one hearsit in drawing the breechlesl of the small cannon."

Forster ll 69 r

The ball of the bombard shot through the mist makes a much shorter course and lesspercussion than that which is shot through the pure thin air; but it still makes a considerablylouder report.

Leonardo is interested in the use of existing holes or ditches for amplification ofwind instruments (K z r):

The shepherds in the Romagna in the Apennines use large hollows (concavities) in themountains in the shape of a horn, and put in a real hom so that this small horn becomes partof the concave space. In this way they produce an enormous sound.

A somewhat similar device in using the existing terain for musical perfor-mance is frequently found in the Swiss mountains. Players of the alpenhorn choosetheir position with respect to a vertical opposite rock at an appropriate distance sothat the wall throws back the melodies in a carefully calculated time lag. In the Eigerregion I often heard an alpenhom player performing canons with the echo of hismelody.

Forster Il3zv, which is based not on observation of musical practices or localcustoms but on acoustical experiment, will be discussed later.

Two entries, Triv. 43 r (TavolaTl a) and the much longer CA 36o ra, touch onthe phenomenon of the lingering of sound:

Tria. 4j r (Taaola 7j a)

I say that every body moved or struck keeps in itself for some time the nature of this blow ormovement, and keeps it so much more or less in proportion as the power or the force of thisblow or movement is greater or less.

Example:Observe a stone ejected from a bombard, how much it preserves the nature of the

movement. The blow given on a thick body will keep its sound longer than on a thinbody, and that will be of longest duration which is made upon a body that is suspended andthin. The eye keeps within itself the images of luminous bodies for a certain interval oftime.26

This analogy of Leonardo's implies a confusion of two phenomena that appearas the lingering of sensuous impressions. One is the continuing vibration in the

26. MacCurdy (vol. r, pp. z8z-83) quotes this passage under the wrong number (TR 73 a). It is Tll43 r, Tavola 73 a.


sounding object, which is a physical occurrence and has nothing to do with thereceiver of sound, the ear; the other is the afterimage retained in the eye after it hasreceived an impact of light. The latter is a physiological phenomenon; it occurs onlyin the receiving organ, the eye, and not in the luminous body sending forth light.

CA j6o ra

A longer whole catalogue of observations is found in CA 36o ra.It starts with thephenomenon of sound, especially in "bells and suchlike things" and widens thecircle of analogies by including "the radiance of the sun or other luminous bodies"and the circling of the firebrand "remaining in the eye"; the raindrops are perceivedas "continuous threads" by the retaining (retentive) force of the eye. Mirrors, how-ever, as unsensitive objects, cannot, unlike the eye, preserve impressions. Yet-again the circle of analogies more widely expands-other objects are capable ofpreserving impressions, such as water waves, the eddies of water, winds, and aknife stuck into a table and set quivering. Finally, the voice is mentioned travelingthrough the air without displacing it, impressing itself upon objects, and returningto its source.

Every impression is preserved for a time in its sensitive object; and that which was ofgreater power will be preserved in its object for a longer time, and for a shorter time with theless powerful.

In this connection I apply the term sensitive to such object as by any impression ischanged from that which was at first an insensitive object-that is one which, n hile changingfrom its first state preserves within itself no impression of the thing which has moved it. Thesensible impression is that of a blow received upon a resounding substance, such as bells andsuchlike things, or like the note in the ear, which, indeed, unless it preserved the impressionof the notes, could never derive pleasure from hearing a voice alone; for when it passesimmediately from the first to the fifth note the effect is as though one heard these two notes atthe same time, and thus perceived the true harmony which the first makes with the fifth; butif the impression of the first note did not remain in the ear for an appreciable space of time,the fifth, which follows immediately after the first, would seem alone, and one note cannotcreate any harmony, and consequently any song whatsoever occurring alone would seem tobe devoid of charm.

So, too, the radiance of the sun or other luminous body remains in the eye for sometime after it has been seen; and the motion of a single firebrand whirled rapidly in a circlecauses this circle to seem one continuous and uniform flame.

The drops of rain water seem continuous threads descending from their clouds; and soherein one may see how the eye preserves the impressions of the moving things which itSECS.

The insensitive objects which do not preserve the impressions of the things which areopposite to them are mirrors, and any polished substance, which, so soon as ever the thing ofwhich it bears the impression is removed from before it, becomes at once entirely deprived ofthat impression. We may, therefore, conclude that it is the action of the mover pressingagainst the body moved by it which moves this body in the direction in which it moves.


Among the cases of impressions being preserved in various bodies we may also in-stance the wave, the eddies of the water, the winds in the air, and a knife stuck into a table,which on being bent in one direction and then released, retains for a long time a quiveringmovement, all its movements being reciprocal one of another, and all may be said to beapproaching towards the perpendicular of the surface where the knife is fixed by its point.27

The voice impresses itself through the air without displacement of air, and strikes uponthe objects and returns back to its source. [MacCurdy, vol. r, pp. 534-5]

One point in this long entry deserves special comment because of its impor-tance to musical aesthetics and the psychology of the perception of harmony.Leonardo states that the ear, "unless it preserved the impression of the notes, couldnever derive pleasure from hearing a voice alone." He describes the melting of afading tone into the inception of its successor, which permits the perception ofharmony in listening to a melody. One is tempted to ask how deeply he followed thisnotion in his discussions with Gaffurius.28

Forster ll jz a

With Forster II 3z v begins a series of explorations of the fading of sound, especiallythe ratio of fading in relation to the volume of the vibrating body and the distancebetween it and the ear:

If a bell were to be heard two miles, and then it were to be melted down and recast intomany small bells, certainly they would never be heard at as great a distance as when theywere all in one single bell. [MacCurdy, vol. r, p. 288]

AzjrIn Forster II 3zv Leonardo cautiously refrains from indicating a precise mathematicalratio between the duplication of bells and the diminution of the distance between thesounding body and the listening ear. The same is true ("could not be heard as far") inAz3r:

Of the Voice.Whether many tiny voices joined together will make as much noise as one large one; I

say "r.o," for if you were to take ten thousand voices of flies all together, they could not beheard as far as the voice of a single man, and if such voice of a man were split into tenthousand parts, none of these parts would be equal to the loudness of the voice of one fly.[Adapted from MacCurdy, vol. r, p. 284)

A$rIn A 43 r, Leonardo comes at least near to posing the possibility of mathematicalratios: "tzDice as strong . . . twice as far."

27. A sketch of such a vibrating knife was drawn by Leonardo in C 15 r for an investigation whichdoes not concern us here.

28. See p. 5 on Gaffurius.


Whether a sound that is twice as strong as another will be heard twice as far. I say that itwill not because if it were so then two men shouting would be heard twice as far as one; butexperience does not confirm this. [MacCurdy, vol. t, p. 284)

But the last remark, that "experience does not confirm this,,, keeps the ex-plorer away from any commitment to ratios.

LTga

InL 79 v (illus. 7.18) Leonardo finally takes the last step and tries to establish strictmathematical proportions between the loudness of a sound at its origin and itsrange, the distant point in space up to which it can be heard.

The diagram shows a triangle with its base indicating the initial volume of thevoice, and with its apex the end of its range; the triangle is divided into four sectionsindicating that in half the distance the volume is reduced to one half. In comparison,both of the two smaller triangles begin with half the initial volume of the longertriangle, and therefore reach only to half its range.

The fading of voice through distance.At the distance a b the two voices m n ate diminished by half; consequently although

there are two half voices they are not as powerful as one whole voice but merely as a half.And if an infinite number of halves should find themselves at such distanc" if,"y would

only amount to a half.Andatthesamedistancethevoice/whichisdouble nandmhavinglostthefourthpart

of its power remains consequently as a voice and a half, and surpasses in three times thePower/ so that at three times the distance, that is at g, f will be as power ful as mn are at thedistance a b. [MacCurdy, vol. r, p. 287)

LSor

L 8o r goes still further: "Where one voice does not carryt a multiple, however great,made up of voices equal to the aforesaid will not carry" (MacCurdy , vol. r, p. iaz).

The diagram (illus. 7.19) shows seven small triangles, all pointing to the centerpoint not reached by their apexes, evidently the ear.

Neither Leonardo nor any commentator has ever explained the added littleornament consisting of seven six-pointed stars. To the careful student of Leonardo,sanalogies, the meaning is not hard to find: seven flowers, clearly a bird's-eye view ofone of Leonardo's beloved flowers, the star of Bethlehem(Ornithogalumumbellatum)(illus. 7.2o), a little graphic memo reminding himself to explore whether smell be-haves like sound and whether the fading of its range is comparable to that of sound.One thing is strange-that Leonardo introduces, at least in graphic form, an analogybetween sound and the olfactory realm but that his ofte; uied analogy betweensound and light (the realm of vision) is not introduced here or in the p."rio6 entry(L Zg v).Actually, it would be just there that a strict analogy exists: the proportionsbetween the loudness of sound and the degrees of its diminution by distinci resem-ble the proportions between the size of a visible object and the degiees of its diminu-

125

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r 7.20. Star of Bethlehen and other plants.r+ Drawing, windsor tz4z4.

RESEARCH ON ACOUSTICS a27

tion by distance. In fact Leonardo tried to establish here a theory of the perspective ofsound parallel to his laws of linear perspective laid down in his Trattato della Pittura.

vELOCTTY (SPEED) OF SOUND

Characteristic examples of observations on the speed of sound are found in A 19 randleg (8r) v.

ArgrOne part of Ar9 r is based on the well-known comparison between the travel of lightrepresented by the flash of lightning and the travel of sound represented by thun-der:

It is possible to recognize by the ear the distance of a clap of thunder on seeing its flash[by seeing first the flash of lightningl, from its resemblance to the note [sound] of the echo.

[This is only part of a long paragraph, adapted from MacCurdy, vol. r, p. 283]

I rzg (8r) a

The second example, I rz9 (8r) v (illus. 7.zt), states the proportion between units oftime and space, couched in the form of a question:

7.2r. Proportions between units of timeand space. I rz9 v.

If the sound of the echo answers in two divisions of time at thirty braccia, in how manydivisions will it answer if it is a hundred braccia away? [MacCurdy, vol. t, p. 286]

a28 RESEARCH oN Acousrrcs

(If it travels 3o feet in z seconds, how many seconds w,ill it take to travel roo feet?)This is only the first part of a long note, the remainder of which is devoted to theproblem of the volume of sound.

LOSS OF SUBSTANCE THROUGH EMITTING SOUND

CA z7o tsc

Objects that lose substance by emitting sound are treated by Leonardo as one ofseveral cases where substance or power is lost through the emission of rays. The lossof power, substance, or shape by an object that sends forth rays making an impact onthe eye, the ear, the olfactory sense, or the human organs sensing heat, is discussedby Leonardo in CA 2To vc in the form of questions to the reader or to himself-sincethe observations recorded in the notebooks were not necessarily meant for publica-tion.

Here we have a multiple analogy between various senses: sight, heat, sound,and odor. The first is vision. Leonardo discusses the problem of "emanations" fromobjects to the eye in the form of "likenesses" or images in great detail in the CodiceAtlantico and in MS D. Because our chapter deals not with light but chiefly withsound, we cannot follow up Leonardo's theory on the eye and on light here but mayonly briefly state that he bases some of his theories on the eye and the images on theancients, especially Democritus and Lucretius, and some also, although with dif-ferent results, on the Stoics.

The following quotation from CA z7o vc shows that an object surrounded byan infinity of its images does not involve a diminution of its substance. Leonardomentions that the sun does not suffer loss of h e a t throueh its radiance, or the northstar a loss of shape:

Qualities of the SunThe sun has body, shape, motion, splendor, heat, and generating force, all things

which stem from it without diminution.I say that the power of vision extends by means of the visual rays as far as the surface of

bodies which are not transparent, and that the power possessed by these bodies extends tothe power of vision, and that every similar body fills all the surrounding air with its image.Each body separately and all together do the same, and not only do they fill it with thelikeness of their shape, but also with that of their power.

ExampleYou see the sun when it is at the center of our hemisphere, and how there are images of

its form in all the parts where it reveals itself, and you see how in all these same places thereare also the images of its radiance, and to these must also be added the image of the power ofits h e a f; and all these powers proceed from the same source by means of radiant lines whichissue from its body and end in the opaque objects without undergoing any diminution.

The north star remains continually with the images of its power spread out, becoming

l


incorporated not only in thin but in thick bodies, in those transparent and those opaque, butit does not on this account suffer any loss of its shape.

These statements are followed by a tentative "confutation" by mathematiciansdealing with a possible diminution of the power of vision by beholding the stars:

ConfutationThose mathematicians, then, who say that the eye has no spiritual power which ex-

tends to a distance from itself, since, if it were so, it could notbe without great diminution inthe use of the power of vision, and that though the eye were as great as the body of the earth itwould of necessity be consumed in beholding the stars: for this reason they maintain that the

eye takes in but does not send forth anything from itself.2e

Then follow two other examples, examining the odor of m u s k and the sound

of b e I I s with respect to the possible loss of substance by the emitting objects:

ExampleWhat will these say of the musk which always keeps a great quantity of the atmosphere

charged with its o d o r, and which, if it be carried a thousand miles, will permeate a thousandmiles with that thickness of atmosphere without any diminution of itself?

Or will they say that the sound which tl:.e b e I / makes on its contact with the clapper,which daily of itself fills the whole countryside with its s o u n d, must of necessity consumethis bell?

Certainly, it seems to me, there are such men as these-and that is all that need be saidof them. [MacCurdy, vol. r, pp. 249-5r)

One wonders whether Leonardo really does expect or hope to meet "suchmen," or does he only express his uneasiness for having fallen prey to hissimilemania?

THE INACCESSIBLE INNER EAR AND THE PHYSIOLOGY OFVOICE PRODUCTION

One may ask why Leonardo, who was profoundly interested in the eye and itsfunction, paid little attention to the ear, its anatomy and physiology. The reason isnot that he was primarily a painter and therefore devoted to the phenomenon ofvision and its rationalization, linear perspective, but that the time was not yet ripefor a methodical examination of the inner ear. The small, complex apparatus of theinner ear is deeply embedded in the massive bone structure of the skull, and therewere neither appropriate tools available for its removal and dissection nor suffi-cient refrigeration and chemicals to preserve the delicate and minute mechanism forany length of time from decomposition.

29. For Leonardo's Italian for this passage, showing how by graphic means he tries to achieve theutmost brevity in his script, see Appendix.

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7.24. In the center, cross section of the brain showing vesicles. Detail, Quademi d,Anatomia V zo v.

The comparatively primitive status of the knowledge of ear anatomy atLeonardo's time is admirably sketched in the pioneering book Leonardo daVinci, theAnatomist byJ. PlayfairMcMurrich (Baltimore:Carnegielnstitute, a93o),towhichalllater treatises on Leonardo's anatomical research are indebted or should admit in-debtedness. Only one of his quotations from Leonardo's notebooks pertinent to theinner ear may suffice to illuminate the situation: "To hear the sound of a voice it isnecessary that it should resound in the concave porosity of the petrous bone, whichis to the inner side of the ear, whence it is carried to the sensus communis,,(WindsorAN. B. 79Cr79 IB z R], McMurrich, p. 2ail.It is significant that among the hundreds ofaccurate and ingenious anatomical drawings by Leonardo there is not a single one ofthe inner or middle ear-not even a diagrammatical or hypothetical on-e. In thedrawings of the cranium the location of the ear is left blank. ind among the severalsketches of the brain and cranial nerves there are only a few in which. besides theoptical nerves, the acoustical nerves are at least marked as they lead from the outerear to the center of sensation, called by Galen and in medieval terminology thesensus communis. The groping approach of Leonardo, harking back to ancieni andmedieval notions, is of great interest. It reveals how he, dissatisfied with the state ofanatomy he found, tried to free himself from traditional notions of the five sensesand their location in the body and to proceed to a more consistent solution.

The most characteristic diagrams showing the location of the acoustical nerveand the other sensory nerves in the brain are the foilowing three:

Quaderni d'AnatomiaV 6 u, Windsor rz6ojr, O,Malley r4z (illus. 7.22)30

The diagram on the left shows an onion cut through the middle for comparison withthe layers in the sagittal section of the head in the large drawing in the center of the

3o. Charles D. O'Malley and J. B. Saunders, Leonardo da Vinci on the Human Body (New york:Henry Schuman, r95z).


page. In this large drawing the optic nerve runs from the eye to the anterior of thethree brain vesicles receiving the sensory nerves and therefore called the sensuscommunis; the ear is not shown. In the lower right corner of the page we see thehorizontal section of the head. Here, the acoustic nerves are also shown, leadingfrom the ear lobes to the sensus communis, but the apparatus of the ear itself is notshown at all.

Quaderni d'AnatomiaV r5 r, Windsor rz6z6r, O'Malley r59 Gllus. 7.zj)

Here a diagrammatic cross section of the brain shows the optic nerves passing to theanterior vesicle but the acoustic nerves as well as the olfactory nerves passing to themiddle vesicle. The inner ear is not shown.

7.25. Diagram of the brain and the loca-tion of the senses from G. Reisch'sMargaita Philosophiae (Strasbourg,15C,4).

Quaderni d'AnatomiaV zo a, Windsor r2627r, O'Malley r6o (illus. 7.zl)

Here we find the same location of the sensory nerves as in Quaderni d'Anatomia V15 r: the optic nerves attached to the first vesicle ("imprensiva"), the olfactory andthe acoustic nerves to the second vesicle ("conoscimento"). Again, the inner ear isnot shown.

To show one example of the general level of knowledge of brain anatomy inLeonardo's day, especially of the connection between the ear and the brain, wereproduce one example from a well-known book on anatomy from that time (G.Reisch's Margarita Philosophiae [Strassburg, ryo4) [illus. 7.2il).The drawing is enti-tled animae sensitioae; the tongue is marked "gusto," the upper part of the nose"olfactory"; these tw'o senses together with the optic and acoustic pass to the frontalvesicle, which bears the inscription "fantasia" and "imaginativa." The middlevesicle is inscribed "cogitatio" and "estimatro"; the posterior vesicle is inscribed"memoranda." Here, as in Leonardo's various diagrams of the auditory nervepassing from the ear to the brain, the inner ear is completely omitted.

It remains to examine Leonardo's sketches of the voice-producing organs suchas the trachea and larynx. A study of his phonetics, that is, of the speaking andsinging voice, its production, and the anatomical and physiological factors involved,would amount to a whole treatise and would exceed the scope of the present vol-ume. Furtherrnore, such a book already exists: the excellent volume Leonardo als

Phonetiker by G. Panconcelli-Calzia (Hamburg, 1g$).


But we can be very brief. For several reasons, Leonardo took as models for hissketches not human organs but parts of animal bodies-pigs, oxen, and dogs;human bodies for dissection were not always obtainable, and as with the inner ear,there were no chemicals to preserve the delicate vocal cords. He also, again, leanedheavily on earlier authors on anatomy, from Galen to those of his own day. It isobvious from his notebooks that he was unaware of the vocal cords, and this led tohis erroneous interpretation of the function of the trachea in changing the pitch ofthe human voice through widening and narrowing of what he called "anule dellatrachea" (cartilage rings of the trachea). For further discussion of this subject, see p.192 concerning his invention of the glissando flute.

LINGERING OF SOUND IN THE OB]ECT PRODUCING IT;AFTERIMAGES AND ANALOGIES WITH LIGHT AND SMELL

CA jjz aa

Leonardo examines the phenomenon of the seeming lingering of sound in a bellafter it has been struck, and mentions two possible causes: (t) a slowly fadingafterimage in the listening ear, and (z) a gradual weakening of the actual vibration ofthe bell.

Strangely enough, he treats the tn'o reasons as alternatives, not allowing forthe coexistence of both.

Of the Sound Which Seems to Remain in theBell after the Stroke

"That sound which remains or seems to remain in the bell after it has received thestroke is not in the bell itself but in the ear of the listener, and the ear retains within itself theimage of the stroke of the bell which it has heard, and only loses it by slow degrees, like thatwhich the impression of the sun creates in the eve, rvhich only by slow degrees becomes lostand is no longer seen."

A proof to the contraryIf the aforesaid proposition were true, you would not be able to cause the sound of the

bell to cease abruptlv by touching it with the palm of the hand, especially at the beginning ofits strength, for surely if it were touched it would not happen that as you touched the bellwith the hand the ear would simultaneously withhold the sound; whereas we see that if afterthe stroke has taken place the hand is placed upon the thing which is struck the soundsuddenly ceases. [MacCurdy, vol. r, p. z8o]

We have discussed the two forms of lingering of sound before (p. ro8) (Triv.43 r [Tavola 7a)) andfound thatleonardo sometimes confuses the physical phenom-enon, the vibration of the bell continuing after the stroke, with the physiological-psychological phenomenon, the impression of sound continuing in its receiver, theear, after the sound itself has stopped. The just quoted statement (CA yzva) suffersfrom the same confusion ("impression of the sun. . . in the eye" becoming lost "by

434 RESEARCH ON ACOUSTTCS

slow degrees"). The "proof to the contrary" is not a valid argument because bothphenomena, the lingering of sound in the producing object, the bell, and the linger-ing of sound in the receiving organ, the ear, can happen simultaneously.

Trhs. 4j r (Taaola 73 a)

The noise preserved in the bell is used by Leonardo as one of several examples of thegeneral principle of the preservation of the impact of a blow: "Obsen e a blow givenon a bell how much it preserves in itself the noise of the percussion."

Leonardo's choice of examples is not consistent since it exceeds the field ofmechanics. (See p. ro8, for quotation and discussion of Triv. 43 r [Tavola 73 a]). Theexamples of bell, bombard projectile, thick and thin bodies, and the influence ofsuspension, all concem the lingering of force within the substance of the struckbody. However, images of luminous bodies preserved in the eye are n'pical afterim-ages and, as such, physiological phenomena.

Azza

Thefirstphrase of Azzvdealswiththephenomenonof theafterimage, namely, thesensory impressions left behind bv the object producing them. Leonardo tries here adaring triple analogy among the bell, the sun, and a smell-producing object: "Thestroke in a bell will leave behind its likeness impressed just as the sun in the eye or thesmell in the air, by placing vour ear to the surface of the bell after the blow.31

But here Leonardo is far from consistent. The triple analogv rvould work only ifone could assume placing the eye near the sun and the nose near the cheese.

IMAGINATION STIMULATED BY VISUAL OR ACOUSTICALSENSATIONS

MS zojS Bib. Nat. zz a

A Way of Stimulating and Arousing the Mind to Various Inventions:I cannot refrain from mentioning among these precepts a new device for study which,

although it may seem but trivial and almost ludicrous, is nevertheless very useful in arousingthe mind to various inventions.

And this is, when you look at a wall spotted with stains, or with a mixture of differentkinds of stones, if you have to invent some scene, you may discover a similarit_v withdifferent kinds of landscapes, embellished with mountains, rivers, rocks, trees, plains, widevalleys and hills in varied arrangement; or, again, you may see battles and figures in action orstrange faces and costumes, and an endless variety of objects which you could reduce tocomplete and well-drawn forms.

It happens with this confused appearance of walls as it does with the sound of bells inwhose jangle you may find any name or word you can imagine. [translation by the author]

3r. Richter's translation (vol. z, p. z3r, #rrz9A) omits the end of the phrase, from " airr" to "blow."


Leonardo's observations about blots have often been mentioned in the litera-ture. The n'eli-known Rorschach test, using a symmetrical configuration of inkblots,is based on a similar process of imagination. But less attention has been given toLeonardo's comparison of a visual stimulation with an audible one, the triggering ofverbal association by the sound of bells. A similar observation was made by thefifteen-r'ear-old Mozart in a letter that he wrote from Milan to his sister in Salzburg,on August 24, 777a.He mentions the terrible heat during his journey to Milan andcontinues with a description of his lodging: "On top of us is a viol player; beneath us,another one; next door is a singing teacher who gives lessons; in the last room is anoboist. This puts one into a good mood for composing, gives one many ideas.,,

It is remarkable that Mozart, when composing, was not at all disturbed byparticipation in noisy pastimes such as bowling, and, especially, his most belovedgame, billiards.32 rn1787, during a bowling party in the garden of his friend, thecomPoser Duschek, in a suburb of Prague, Mozart composed several pieces for hisoPera Don Gioaanni. When his tum came, he arose, but as soon as it was over, heimmediately continued composing without being disturbed by the talking andlaughing company. As for billiards, Nissen reports:

In t79r, while Mozart wrote the coronation opera, La Clemenza di Tito, he visited almost dailywith his friends at a coffee house near his home, in order to play billiards. One could observethat for several days during playing, he repeatedly hummed one motif softly to himself, tookout a little booklet from his pocket n'hile his partner played, glanced quickly into it, andplayed again. How astonished even'bodv n'as when Mozart, in the house-of Duschek,played on the piano for his friends the beautiful quintet from The Magic Flute of Tamino,Papageno, and the three ladies, r.r'hich begrns n'ith the same motif that had occupied himduring the billiard game.33

SYMBOLIC ASPECTS OF SOUND

1 65 (t) r: A "Prophecy"

The wind plays a role in one of the many riddles called "prophecies,"3a written byLeonardo for the entertainment of the Milanese court: "The wind passing through

3z' See E. Winternitz, "Gnagflow Trazom: An Essav on Mozart's Script, Pastimes, and Non-sense Letters," in Journal of the American Musicological Society 11, nos. z1 $955).

33. Leitzmann, W. A. Mozarts Leben, p. rr3. The quotation is from Georg Nikolaus von Nissen'sbiography of Mozart:

Mozatt, wiihrend er 179L die Kronungsoper "La Clemenza di Tito" schrieb, besuchte fast tdglich mitseinen Freunden ein unlr'eit seiner Wohnung gelegenes Kaffeehaus, um mit Billardspieleri sich zuzerstreuen. Man bemerkte einige Tage lang, dass er wiihrend dem Spielen ein Motiv ganz leise ftirsich mit "hm hm hm" sang, mehrmals, wiihrend der andere spielte, ein Buch aus dei Tasche zog,fluchtige Blicke hineinwarf und dann wieder fortspielte. Wie ersiaunt war man, als Mozart auf einmalseinen Freunden in Duschets Hause das schcine Quintett aus der "Zauberflote" zwischen Tamino,Papageno und den drei Damen, das gerade mit demselben Motive beginnt, welches Mozarten wdhrenddes Billardspielens so beschiiftigt hatte, auf dem Klaviere vorspielte.

34. To characterize the kind of forecasts and riddles collected under the name "prophecies, " I will


the skins of animals will make men leap-that is, the bagpipe, which makes people

dance [Il vento passato per le pelli delti animali fard saltare li omini; cio6 la piva che fa

ballarel."

H 67 r: Three Elements and the Soul

Sometimes Leonardo used the phenomenon of sound as one item of several within a

comprehensive analogy, for instance, in a comparison of the three elements of

water, sound, and fire with the mind (soul, spirit).

Of the SoulMovement of earth against earth pressing down upon it causes a slight movement of

parts struck.Water struck by water creates circles at a great distance round the spot rvhere it is

struck; the sound in the air goes further; still further in fire; mind ranges over the universe

but, being finite, does not extend into infinity.35

Windsor An. A rgor2 a (A r S a): Finger ltlerues and the Mind of the Organ Player

Leonardo's anatomical exploration of the mechanism of the hand and the function of

the median and ulnar nerves reminds him of the needs of the organ plaver: "See if you

understand that this sense [of touch] is employed by the player of an organ, and that

the mind at such time is attentive to the sense of hearing."

Triu. 4o a (Taaola 7r a): Soul and Soundbeyond Cotruption

The importance of the n,ind and breath as carriers of sound and symbols of the soul

is very alive in Leonardo, a symbolism perhaps suggested b)' the relation between

the words spirito and inspirare and inspirazione. "The soul can never be infected by

the corruption of the body, but acts in the body like the rvind rvhich causes the sound

of the orgur,, wherein if one of the pipes becomes spoiled, no good effect can be

produced because of its emptiness."36

quote two more although they do not deal with music: (l 65 r) "Men will deal bitterblows to that w'hich

is the cause of their life-in thrashing grain." "The skins of animals will rouse men from their silence

with great outcries and curses-balls for playing games."

15. ,,De Anima. Ilmoto della terra contro allatera ricalcando quella poco simove leparte Percosse.

t-u.qri perchassa [percossa] dallacqua facir culi dintomo alloco perchosso per lunga distantia lavoce

infrallaria piv lunga infral foco piv lamen te infralluyverso maperche le fini ta nonsastende infra

llonfinito."Leonardo's reference to the friction of the heavenly spheres and their harmony has been discussed

in "Origin of Sound, F 56v" (P. ro5).

351 "Lanima mai Ji puo.io.ro-p".". nella coruttion del corpo ma ffa nel corpo assimilidine del

vento che chavsa del sont del organoihe quasstandosi van chani non resultava per quella del voto

buono effectto."

CHAPTER EIGHT

7'ftw String lnstruments and the

Ciola Organisfa

It is odd that the many sketches for musical instruments and musical machinescontained in the pages of Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks have never found athorough and systematic interpretation. It is true that some look rather fantastic, atleast to us today, and others are clearly only quick embodiments of passing ideas putdown on paper by Leonardo to aid his own memory. However, nearly all thesketches reveal themselves as most interesting, and many as ingenious new inven-tions, if they are scrutinized and analvzed in the right context: that is, against thebackground of the instruments existing at Leonardo's time, with a knowledge ofclockworks and other mechanical der.ices used by Leonardo outside the field ofmusical instruments, and examined in the light of Leonardo's leading ideas for in-struments which can be distilled from a comparison of all the drawings and his manyremarks on music, musical aesthetics, and acoustics.l

For their help in my study of the wide range of musical instruments invented by Leonardo (seechapter 8, belorv), I wish to express my profound gratitude to my old and good friends: the lateProfessor Ladislao Reti, and Professors Augusto Marinoni and Carlo Pedretti. Professor Reti, who in1967 discovered the 7oo-page manuscript of Leonardo that had been lost or misfiled in the BibliotecaNacional in Madrid, informed me without delay of sketches of musical instruments in these codicesshowing mechanized drums (MS I folio 9r v and folio 16o r), unusual bellows operated by the elbow (MSII folio 76r), and bells with a damper mechanism (MS II folioT5 v), all discussed in this chapter.Professors Marinoni and Pedretti both brought to my attention the two sketches for musical instru-ments in the Codice Atlantico (zt3va and 34 rb), which had not been considered in my article "Leonar-do's Invention of the Viola Organista" for the Raccolta Vinciana nry64 Pedretti pointed this out in hisRichter Commentaries (Commentary on the Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci, p. zl:6), rightly suggestingalso that I should consider H to4 v as related to CA 34 rb, and that these illustrations should be printedin an upright rather than sideways view. He also suggested that both instruments are operated by a legof the walking player, or by an arrangement of a belt and straps attached to the body of the player;Pedretti also helped me to clarify a tentative chronology of the codices. I was also greatly helped bydiscussions with Bo Lawergren, composer and professor of physics at Hunter College, New York,whose knowledge of theoretical and applied mechanics in historical perspective led to clarificationof the mechanics in CA zg va and 34 rb.

r. Leonardo's many notebooks attest to his insatiable curiosity about what nature could tell himand what he could learn from books. In the preceding chapter on acoustics there are not only numerousexamples of his own experiments but also references to the authority of Vitruvius, for instance, con-

r37

88 STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

Among the many musical instruments and machines contrived byLeonardo-string instruments, drums, bells, and wind instruments-the viola or-ganista is by far the most complicated. No fewer than ten different pages in thenotebooks show sketches for it:fol. z8r, z8v, 45v, 46 r, and ro4 r'in codex H; folio 5ov in codex B; folio 34rb, 2t3va, and zr8 rc in the Codice Atlantico; and folio 76 r in theMadrid MS IL

None of them are precise drawings for an instrument builder, and some are noteven completely thought through since several details would probablv have beenfound impracticable in actual construction. However, to anticipate the outcome ofour analysis, they are all concerned with the idea of a stringed inslrument withkeyboard in which the strings are set into vibration by a mechanical device-awheel, a bow with a back-and-forth motion, or a belt of hair mor-ing across thestrings as a sort of endless bow. Such an instrument would fill a big gap in themultitudinous array of instruments not only of Leonardo's time but also of ourstoday. It would combine the polyphonic possibilities of the keyboard u-ith the tonecolor of strings and thus would be something like an organ n,ith string timbreinstead of wind timbre.

The mechanical obstacles confronting the builder of such an instrument are

obvious. The bow in the hand of a fiddler selects the string wanted; it can easily turnfrom one string to another or even press against two strings simultaneously and, inthe case of the early viol with a flat bridge and soft bow, against three strings at thesame time. The bow can travel either quickly or slowly and exert heavy or lightpressure upon the strings. But if a mechanical bow is to be used, the problemimmediately arises as to horv to select, in turn, the strings n'hich are supposed tosound, and how to press them against the vibrating device, be it a friction wheel, a

belt of hair, or a shuttling bow.2Instruments with friction wheels existed before Leonardo's time and were still

popular in his day although their mechanism and musical capacity were incomPara-

bly simpler than his elaborate contrivances, which amounted to nothing less than a

one-man orchestra. In connection with these other instruments we must mention,above all, the hurdy-gurdy-known variously as the ghironda, aielle d roue, and

ceming the study of echo. But did he also consult contemporarv literature on music and musicalinstruments, such as the famous, enormous encyclopedia bv Giorgio Valla, written in sumptuous,humanist Latin, "Giorgii Vallae Placentini viri clarissimi De Expetendis et t'ugiendis rebus..." (Venice,

t5cr.), Things to Seek and Things to Aaoid? Yalla (r447j9) lived for many years in Milan, and Leonardohad a copy of the encyclopedia, if we can so interpret the inclusion of Valla's name in Leonardo'sinventory of his own books (in Madrid MS II 75 v).

Valla's encyclopedia with its 49 books in z,n9 chapters includes no fewer than five chapters (58

pages) on music. They all treat of the mathematical aspects of musical theory and contain no discussion

whatever of musical instruments and their practice in his and Leonardo's time. Augusto Marinoni, whovery kindly sent me a summary of these five chapters, believes that Leonardo never read them.

z. In the twentieth century, only some ingenious ideas of Emanuel Mo6r, the inventor of the

Mo6r duplex piano, include suggestions for an instrument combining the bowing of many strings witha keyboard. See Max Pirani, Emanuel Moor, p. 9\ "During the winter of r9r9-r9zo he made experimentswith a horizontal instrument based on the principles of the violin . . . to be used for orchestral PurPosesand intended to replace not only violins, but all the members of the string family."

8.r. French hurdy-gurdy in lute shape,eighteenth century. MetropolitanMuseum of Art, The Crosby BrownCollection.

8.2. Wheel and stopping mechanism ofa French eighteenth-centuryhurdy-gurdy in guitar shape. Met-ropolitan Museum of Art, TheCrosby Brown Collection. m*

i$:ii; a:ii:L']:li

.&.:r.'.r:i:i::ii::i

740 STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

Drehleier-a sort of mechanical fiddle of venerable history. This instrument wasalready popular in the Middle Ages and appeared at that time almost all overEurope, and it is still being played today as a folk instrument in certain regions ofFrance.3

The hurdy-gurdy can have different shapes: its sound box may resemble alute, guitar, or fiddle, but the strings stretched along it are neither plucked norbowed, being set into vibration by a wooden wheel revolving in the middle of thesound box and turned by a crank at its tail end (illus. 8.r). The smooth edge ofthe wheel, which is coated with resin, serves as an endless bow. Like the pipes of thetypical bagpipe, the strings differ in kind and function: there are stopped ones (the

melody strings, or chanterelles) running along the middle of the sound box and openones (the drones, or bourdons) running on either side. The meiodv strings are

stopped by a primitive key mechanism, a set of stopping rods (naturals and sharps)

equipped with little projections that press inward against the strings n'hen the rodsare pushed in (illus. 8.2). Thus, a full scale can be produced. When released, the rodfalls back of its own weight. Consequentty the hurdy-gurdy is held and played withthe keyboard down. As the two melody strings are tuned in unison, each rod has

two projections simultaneously stopping both strings. When there are tn o drones,

they are tuned in octaves; when there are more, the octave is strengthened by anadded fifth.

8.3 Organistrum played by two eldersend of twelfth century. Portico de laGloria of the Cathedral of Santiagode Compostela.

3. For an account of the origin of this instrument, its function, evolution, and colorful changinghistory as a representation of religious and pastoral symbolism, see my article "Bagpipes and Hurdy-gurdies in theii Social Setting, " Metropolitan Museum ot' Art Bulletin, Summer 1943 , PP. S6-81; reprintedin Musiul lnstruments and Their Symbolism in Western Art, zd ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press,

e7d.

F

STRING TNSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA 74L

A construction of this kind gives the instrument three distinctive features.First, it is mechanized: that is, the strings are touched neither by plucking fingers norby a bow but by an intervening mechanical device, the friction wheel. Second, thehurdy-gurdv, through its wheel, makes possible something which not the lute orthe violin or the harpsichord can render-a continuous sound; the wheel overcomesthe pauses between the single strokes of plucking or bowing. The third distinctivefeature is the accompaniment of a melody by an invariable bass, the drone.

The early history of the hurdy-gurdy is beyond the scope of this book becauseit has no bearing on Leonardo's invention. Thus it should only briefly be mentionedthat the hurdy-gurdy developed from the organistrum of the tenth, eleventh, andtwelfth centuries: a large box with a wheel and a crank turned by one player, whileanother manipulated a primitive stopping mechanism. Organistra are depicted inthe sculptures of Romanesque churches such as the cathedrals of Moissac and San-tiago de Compostela (illus. 8.f). By the time of Giotto the smaller and handierone-man instrument, the hurdy-gurdy, had replaced the organistrum. As has beenpointed out, the mechanism of the organistrum and of its successor, the hurdy-gurdy, did not allow the selection of single strings to be sounded alone due to theaction of the wheel rubbing simultaneously against all the strings. It was, in fact, justthis limitation which gave this instrument its charm as a vehicle for that characteris-tic drone music which is still familiar today, even to musical laymen, through thelarge family of bagpipes.a

But while the drone principle is a very ancient one-for instance, in the musicof western Asia, and also of importance in the development of occidentalpolyphony-it plays no role in the invention of Leonardo which we are discussinghere. On the contrary, Leonardo's invention aimed at a machine of maximum free-dom and flexibility, offering to the player precisely that choice of tones or chordswanted at the moment. A drone, humming on continuously, would have been onlyan undesirable restriction of the harmonic possibilities of an instrument such as theviola organista.

Before turning to the analysis of the single drawings it should be pointed outthat their interpretations support one another since several elements such as keysand pushbuttons occur in several of the drawings. Lacking any external indicationsas to their chronology, I have arranged the order according to the inner logic of thedevelopment of one solution from the preceding, less satisfactory one.

Codice Atlantico zr8 rc (illus. 8.4) is completely filled with several sketchesconcerned with different machines. For convenience I will call them A,B, C, D, andE, from top to bottom.

A and B cover the upper third of the narrow page. There is one thing whichimmediately strikes the eye in B-a precise sketch for the typical bow for the viol orthe lira da braccio of the time. The bow is placed over an oblong box without any

4. On the historical relation between hurdy-gurdies and bagpipes as equivalent providers ofdrone music, see ibid.

"'t l)^+.- :- -;r\&"gJii "":;

s*tttl' - 'i

1l!!:'"

,i',i.l*

rilr.

:s,.]": l

-rd

':1tj

*i

& .,,ir.''3i:,,:r,

:!.:

i'r; ){f tl}{ri- -l'*'-

,!,:!.rr' li

8.4. Sketches for different versions oIthe viola organista. CA zr8 rc.

STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

clear indication as to how it is attached. It is crossed by two sets of double lines; theupper set, marked "sopra'l fondo," is drawn more heavily than the lower set, whichis marked "sotto'l fondo." These two double lines converge toward the right, theupper set being drawn strictly parallel to the side walls of the box, and the lower setat a marked angle. This latter fact alone, in view of the unerring sense of perspectivehabitual n'ith Leonardo even in his smallest sketches, seems to exclude the assump-tion that the lower double line indicates vibrating strings.

But the upper set evidently does represent a double string, for we can see thesetwo lines fastened at the left end to two pins, evidently tuning pins which protrudefrom a cube. A clearer idea of this fastening method is gained from sketch A, which isapparently a detail for B. There we notice four sets of double strings with their tuningpins, rvhich are inserted in four little individual doors or frame-shaped bridges. Wemav ask why the tuning pins are not fastened directly to a wrest plank, as it is donein harpsichords or spinetti. The answer, it seems to me, is connected with the prob-lem of selecting the strings which should actually sound: that is, to bring theproper string into contact with the hair of the bow. A device was needed to grasp theproper string and lower or raise it against the bow, from its resting position, in orderthat the string might be set into vibration. If we look at the uppermost of the fourlittle "doors" or frames, \4'e note, protruding from it, three lines strongly suggestinga key. A glimpse at the corresponding area of sketch B confirms this assumption.There must, therefore, have been a keyboard acting through some intermediatelevers or wire loops on the strings. But we consult the drawing in vain for such a

device.If we assume the existence of kevs, as suggested, we must also assume double

strings, as mentioned above, and not single strings, because the supposed key in thedrawings corresponds to one set of double slrings. Double strings for the purpose ofgiving a louder tone were common in the hurdy-gurdy, as it has been described,with its two melody strings tuned in unison and its several bass drone-strings tunedin unison and sometimes at the octave and the fifth, in addition. Which leads to thequestion of how many strings Leonardo's machine was meant to have. I believe thatthe four double strings in A give only an idea of the arrangement but I do not excludethe possibility that there were more than four pairs. To construct such a complexmachine for only four double strings, each sounding only one tone, would hardlyhave been worth the trouble unless there were also a stopping device, perhapssimilar to the tangents of a fretted clavichord or the teeth on the stopping rods of thehurdy-gurdy, which made it possible to produce more than one tone from eachstring. But although these devices in the clavichord and hurdy-gurdy are simple andeasy to construct, in our machine where the keys would be busy in pressing thestrings against the bow, any stopping mechanism subdividing each string for theproper pitch would have been a cumbersome affair and would require more fingersthan God has given to one man.

There remains, finally, another question that is likewise, alas, not sufficientlyanswered by the drawing-the method of moving the bow. As we stated before, nodevice is visible for fastening the bow to the box. In principle, two ways would be

14)



feasible, either to move the bow against the strings or to move the strings against thehair of a stationary bow. The only clue is the device drawn in the middle of the longside of the oblong box in B (illus. 8.5). But here the drawing is too muddled to bereliably interpreted. It may perhaps indicate a sled, gliding on top of the narrow boxor log to the left of the big box. But whether this was to move the bow or the set ofstrings cannot be decided. One can only say that moving the strings sideways underthe bow would have been practical with only a few strings; with a considerablenumber, let us say as in a small spinetta, it would have been difficult even if we donot take into account the problem of having to move the keyboard along with thestrings and, at the same time, manipulate its keys. Thus, the method of moving thebow back and forth seems more probable. But then again, this method would be

very close to what a fiddler does, without any complicated mechanism. In manypages of his notebooks Leonardo was thinking aloud (so to speak) with pencil inhand, amending and replacing again and again his verbal statements and expla-nations, and often abandoning them in favor of a di{ferent formulation. Why shouldhe have done otherwise in his sketches of novel mechanical conceptions? It mayhave been precisely the difficulties described which prompted him to abandon theidea of an actual bow and tum to a more practical device-the friction wheel.

Drawing C (illus. 8.6) in the middle of the page shows an elaborate mechanismwith a large spoked wheel. The idea of the bow in B has apparently been abandonedas impractical, and the vibrating element here is a wheel. Leonardo was, of course,familiar with the popular ghironda of his time, which was then, in its simplest form,a peasant instrument and yet noble enough in more elaborate forms to be played byangels.s A beautiful ghironda is played by an angel in the Sforza Book of Hours (plate

5. Ibid.

144



xxix), written precisely at the time when Leonardo was in Milan (illus. 8.7); an evenmore beautiful one is played by one of the numerous angels in Gaudenzio Ferrari'sfresco in the cupola of the church of Santa Maria Novella in Saronno, north of Milan(illus. 8.8).

In the present drawing the wheel is set into the front part of a large sound boxwhich carries the strings. The curved bridge (ponti) and several hitch pins (bischeri) ,

to its right, are clearly drawn. The large wheel has spokes and a central disk withpins that tally with the sticks of a revolving vertical drum. The wheel is evidentlykept in motion by a horizontal cvlinder partly seen at its right, whose axis terminatesin a little wheel which, in its turn, is moved bv ropes extending down into a little boxwhere we may assume there is a spring as "prime mover." Such springs were usedby Leonardo in similar devices such as, for instance, in his flying machine (cf .B 74r).Instead of springs, the force could of course be supplied by a foot pedal or a weight.

There are two mechanical problems rvhich would have to be solved in a

mechanism such as this. The first concerns the contact between the strings and theedge of the wheel, and the shape of the sounding board thereby required. Ourdrawing gives only an ambiguous answer. If the wheel is really a friction wheel, thestrings rubbed by its edge have to be placed on a plane curved correspondingly, thatis, on a concave soundboard. Would the whole sound box then have to be curved?The seven or eight little curves visible over the words "vocato armonico" seem toindicate a rounded bottom of the sound box. But how about the shape of the sound-board itself? The curved double line indicating the bridge, and marked "ponti," doesnot answer our question since the bridge, as every harpsichord builder knows, maybe curved in the horizontal plane, corresponding to the different lengths of stringsfrom treble to bass. AIso, a large soundboard of concave shape would not be easy tobuild although Hans Hayden's Geigenklavizimbel, built about 16oo in Nurembergand illustrated in Praetorius's Syntagma Musicum, II, "De Organographia" (;.6:.9),

had a soundboard of five concave sections corresponding to its five friction wheels(illus. 8.9). It may be even more instructive to compare Leonardo's sketch and the

145

8.7. Angel playing a hurdv-gurdv.Sforza Book of Hours, plate LXIX.

8.8. Angel plaring a hurdr'-gurdy. Fromthe cupola frero bv GaudenzioFerrari in the Sanluario at Saronno.

STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA 147

illustration of Hayden's instrument with pictures of the only surviving old Geigen-werk built in t6z5 by Fray Raymundo Truchado and preserved in the MahillonCollection of the Conservatoire in Brussels. Illustration 8.ro shows the whole in-strument, with the keyboard deeply set in at the front, the crank protruding at therear, and the strings running over wheels set into the soundboard. Illustration 8.rgives an oblique view of the arrangement of the wheels and bridges and the hooksthat force the strings against the edge of the wheels.6

The other mechanical problem concems again, as we saw in the first drawing,the way in which the player selects the strings.T In the hurdy-gurdy this was noproblem-the wheel rubbed all of them at the same time. But Leonardo's elaboratemachine was evidently meant to produce more complex music than the pastoralmusic of the hurdy-gurdy, with its never silent melody in the treble and incessantdrone in the bass. Richer polyphony was to be expected at the time of Isaac, Ag-ricola, and other famous visitors to the court of Milan and therefore a selectingdevice for each string was needed. As an indication of this device we must considerthe keyboard at the left, for thus one should be inclined to interpret the set of parallellines in front of the architectural structure that carries the wheel and that is, by theway, shaped after the form of an organetto of the time. But how these keys select thestrings is not revealed in the drawing.

However, the last two drawings on our page, sketchy as they are, evidently areconcerned with this problem of selection (illus. 8.rz). In D, which is crossed out andlabeled "falso,"e we see a concave soundboard with a number of strings runningfrom left to right, and a wheel equipped with strings set into the curve of thesoundboard in about the same place as in C. There is no hint of a keyboard as in C,but four sets of diagonal lines cross the strings and terminate in short, upright marksjust where the farther ends of the lines meet the strings. Of these four sets of lines thefirst, which is nearest the wheel and reaches the first string, has eight such marks.The second set, touching the second string, has nine marks; the third, reaching thethird string, likewise has nine marks; and the last, touching the fourth string, showsfive marks although this number may be fewer than for the others merely becausethe margin of the paper had been reached. When I view this drawing, the onlyassociation I can make is with the keys and tangents of a fretted clavichord, in whichthe keys, which are equipped at their rear ends with little upright metal blades thatstrike the string, not only make it vibrate but also divide it at the proper point inorder to obtain the desired tone.

Leonardo was familiar with the clavichord, called at his time monocordo andalso manicordo (one of the wordplays frequent in the Renaissance). The monocordo

6. I took this photograph years ago in bad light and with a small camera. It is slightly blurred yetshows clearly enough the salient features of the wheel mechanism.

7. Even if the wheel mechanism was meant to be an automat, a selective device would have beennecessary. All the musical automata known from later times, as illustrated in Athanasius Kircher'sMusurgia Uniztersalis (Rome, r55o), used the pin barrel as the central device to pluck the strings.

8. Evidently Leonardo, when abandoning sketch D by marking lt "falso," added "buono" tosketch C.

8.9. Geigenklavizimbel. Woodcut fromMichael Praetorius's SyntagmaMusicum ll, "De Organographia,"Nuremberg, 1618.

8.ro. Keyboard instrument with wheels,

built by Truchado, 1625. Brussels

Conservatoire.

Oblique view of the soundboardwith wheels from illus. 8.ro(photographed by the author).

8.rr



of the Renaissance, despite its name, had many stringse-the beautiful largeclavichord or monocordo represented in the intarsias of Federigo da Montefeltro inhis palace at urbino (illus. 8.r3), long before Leonardo's time, had no fewer thantwenty-two strings and forty-seven keys.10 Now if the schematic lines in the draw-ing suggest the clavichord action at all, the first string nearest us could render eighttones, the second nine, the third nine, and the last at least five: in sum, thirty tones:two octaves and a fourth on a chromatic kevboard.

A different method is followed in drarving E, which shows a scheme for asoundboard in more of a central top view than in the other sketches, with a wheel (orpossibly a bow) on the left. Here the arrangement of fifteen strings each crossed by a"tangent," and thus amounting to an equal number of strings and tangents, wouldcorrespond to the action of the unfretted clavichord in which each string sounds itswhole length (one tone) rather than being subdivided into many tones by the actionof several tangents on one string, as in the fretted clavichord described above. IfLeonardo really thought of something like a clavichord action, the keys reachingacross the strings, r,vith the wheel at the left side of the player, would by means of thetangents Press the strings against the wheel or bow. And the keyboard in front of thewheel, such as in C, would have been unnecessary. For this reason I do not thinkthat D and E are merely supplementary sketches to C.

9. In Windsot a235o Leonardo refers to the light reflected on the strings (chorde) of themonochord.

ro. See my article "Quattrocento-Intarsien als Quellen der lnstrumentengeschich te," Bericht i]berden siebenten lnternationalen Musikwissenschafttichen Kongress (Cologne, 1958); ieprinted, in Musical ln-struments.


In looking back at all the drawings on page zr8rc, we find that even if we wereto discard everything which is only guesswork and unexplainable detail, the follow-ing facts remain: Leonardo begins with the idea of a mechanical bow moving backand forth, similar to the actual hand-moved bow of a fiddle; then he discards thisidea and turns to the more reliable device of the friction wheel, adds keys, andevidently begins to grope for a method of how to stop the strings and how to makethem touch the wheel. We can now justify why we began our interpretation ofLeonardo's musical machines with zr8 rc: it includes the most primitive device-thefiddle bow-and one other traditional device known from the ghironda-the wheel.But no satisfactory method seems to have been found. The wheel mechanism comesnearest to a practical solution and in fact, long after Leonardo and certainly withouthis influence, was incorporated into Hayden's Geigenwerk, which we describedearlier. However, we will see in the other drawings discussed here that the wheelidea is likewise abandoned.

Manuscript H z8 v (illus. 8.r4) contains three drawings, but before kying tointerpret them one must pose the question as to which is the top and which is thebottom of the page. The natural position for the big musical machine seems to bewith the flat side down, as if it were to be placed on a table. But in that case the fewwords written on the page, "tessta della viola" arrd "tasti della viola," would beupside down. In the facsimile edition of MS H (Ravaisson-Mollien,:'$g:,) the page isreproduced with the writing upside down. It may be, of course, that Leonardo drewthe machine that way and made notes later without regard to the position of the

l

l

8.r3. Clavichord; detail of the intarsias in the Studiolo of Federigo da Montefeltro in his palace in Urbino.

8.r4. MS H z8 v. Three drawings for aviola organista.

8.r5. MS H z8 r. Drawings for the ma-chinerv of a viola organista.

a52 STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

drawings. On the other hand the explanations are done with unusual neatness,aligned with the drawings. Thus, the following analysis refers to the drawing rviththe writing in upright position.

The large instrument on the left is a polyhedron with a broad flat base and fivesides, of which at least two are employed as soundboards. The most striking detail isthe friction device: this time a double belt, probably of hair or silk thread, passingover three small spindles at the upper end of the sound box. The spindles areevidently activated by the double wheel shown at the lower end of the sound box,whose source of motion is indicated. Two of the sides of the sound box, middle andleft, carry strings; the left also clearly shows a bridge for the hitch pins. The littlecircles arranged on the upper end of the soundbox may indicate keys or pushbuttons. If this is so, the line leading down from one of the middle kevs to one of thestrings may indicate a lever by which the key brings the string in contact with thedouble belt, or endless bow. And further expanding our assumption that these littleobjects are keys, their number and arrangement would make one expect that stringswould cover all sides of the sound box and not just the two which I have pointed out.But in that case, how would the box be held or placed? This is not clear in thedrawing.

Although many details are drawn in only a suggestive manner, Leonardo didtake great care to make clear that the bow passes over rather than beneath thestrings. Attention should also be drawn to the fact that in this drawing we meet forthe first time the name given bv Leonardo to this type of machine: viola.

The double wheel device on the lower end of the soundboard can be identifiedwith the help of MSS H z8 r, H 46r, andH 45v as part of the motor that furnishes thedrive for the endless bon' or archetto. However, the way by which it is connectedwith the archetto is not indicated in the present drawing. The smaller polygonalsound box on the same page is perhaps a passing idea or a variant of the largerinstrument.

The drawing of the fasfl consists of a double row of push buttons in the samecubic shape which we will encounter again in MS H 45 v. They have no visiblerelation to the instruments on this page. The possibililv that the double row mayimply a chromatic arrangement must remain an open question.

The opposite side of the same leaf (MS H z8 r [illus. 8.r5]) gives more detailedalthough different versions of the wheel mechanism that drives the endless bowindicated in MS H z8 v. On the left a large wheel is shown, and beneath it is a rodcylinder or pinion cage, whose vertical rods engage horizontal pins of a contrivancewhich is only sketchily drawn but whose shape reminds one of that part inclockworks which serves to retard and regulate the motion of the wheels. On theright of the horizontal wheel there is an indication of the threads or hairs of thearchetto (see MS H z8 v).

The wheel machinery in mid-page is somewhat different although probablyonly in the shape and dimensions of the structural parts, not in their function. Thepinion cage is much larger and more distant from the upper wheel. The drawing ofits vertical rods is somewhat obscured by a cluster of horizontal lines which may

8.16. MS H 46 r. Two sketches relating tothe viola organista, and a map of ariver, perhaps for a project ofcanalization.

it

MS H 45 v. Sketch of a viola or-ganista with details of construc-tion.

8.rj

ri

A54 STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

again suggest an anchor device. Of greatest interest, hon'ever, is the indication ofthe endless bow, running from the right of the pinion cage toward the spindle (or,possibly, capsule), which contains the spring. The explanation written there says: "amolla ceritor ni indi rieto Perse il moto dell'arcetto" (a molla ci ritorni indietro per se ilmoto dell'arcetto); we may translate this, "toward the spring, returns by itself (au-tomatically) the motion of the bow device." This explanahon is important, for itpermits some conclusions as to the type of motion of the archetto, rvhose name, bythe way, we find only on this page and in MS B 5o v.

If the thread moving the archetto returns to the spring, it is evidently woundup there on a spindle, and was wound up before at its other end, around the pinioncage. This implies a continuous motion in one direction without pauses rather thanthe movement back and forth which the fiddle bow performs. (We n-ill come back tothis problem in the interpretation of MS B 50 v). When the spring n'as coiled, thethread of the archetto must have been wound around the pinion cage; when thespring was released, the thread was drawn toward it in a smooth motion, owing tothe retarding motion of the anchor, until it was wound up on the spring.

There remains another question: the meaning of the three long rods (withhalf-moon crutches) extending below the whole machinery. They must be pedallevers to activate-perhaps by u'inding-the wheel machinery, u'hich in its turnguarantees an easy, regular motion of the archetto. In an earlier interpretation of thispage I suggested that the rods n'ere trvo-pronged handles, show,n more clearly if thePage were tumed so that the half-moons appear on the left side. But this would notbe in harmony with the six rvritten lines in the center of the page.

ManuscriptH 46 r (illus. 8.16) shows on the left a wheel device for propellingthe archetto, similar to the ones in MS H z8 r. The upper drarving shows a bird's-eyeview of a mechanism rt'ith at least twenty-six strings and a kevboard of sixteen keys.I am not able to explain the two vertical double lines extending from its upper end.The drawing is not precise, for the long oblique bridge that follows the gradation ofstrings from bass to treble does not cross all the strings. The whole drawing isconnected with the viola organista only if one interprets the double line, whichcrosses the strings at their upper end, as the archetto. But this is just as doubtful aninterpretation as saying that at the left and right ends of the double line are revolvingcylinders or spindles over which the archetto would pass. Both these interpretationsare possible but unfortunately the sketch is too unclear to draw such conclusionswith any degree of certainty.

The sketch on the right has no connection with musical instruments. It isevidently a maP of a section of a river, perhaps for a project of canalization. Theinscription says, "Alta giara."

ManuscriptF{ +S v (illus. 8.r7), aswe shall see, is the result of the struggles andattempts embodied in the preceding pages. The sketch on the left shows a perfectlyconsistent, workable keyboard instrument with an endless bow. The soundboard ofthe oblong box carries eight strings, corresponding to the eight push buttons or keys(similar in shape to those drawn in MS H z7 v) projecting from the top of the soundbox. It goes without saying that there could have been more strings and keys, and

-!


the drawing onlv suggests the construction of the machinery. The double line whichmarks the archetto, crossing the strings between the two corner spindles, is clearlyvisible. The archetto is moved by the wheel contrivance developed in MSS H z8 rand H 45 r and is most similar to the latter.

But there is one more important detail about which the preceding pages havegiven no inJormation: the action of keys on the strings to enable them to make contactwith the archetto. The reader would do well to look first at the large sketch on theright, u'hich shows a schematic side view of this device: the levers connecting asingle kev rvith a single string; and a longitudinal view of one string running, parallelto the soundboard, toward the rear bridge and from there, with a slight change ofdirection, toward the hitch pin. If the player pushes the projecting end of the key, aset of ht'o, right angular levers similar to the tracker mechanism used in organs, withtheir pivots clearly marked, turns a little capsule or cylindrical casing that movesaround the horizontal axis. Firmly attached to this casing is another right angularlever terminating in a little circular loop that grasps the string a little distance abovethe point where the archetto passes over the strings. Upon receiving the impetusfrom the key, this loop-lever then draws the string against the moving archetto, thuscreating the required friction. If the reader turns to the whole instrument with thisschematic longitudinal sketch in mind, he will recognize the complete contrivancebuilt in.

The two little sketches at the top are slight variations in the shape of what Ihave called the contact lever; in the sketch at the left the lever is built with a sharpbend, and in the sketch at the right, showing three levers side by side, it is shownwith a slight curve.

With a mechanism such as this, the plaver would be able to graduate theintensity of friction and thus the volume of tone by varying the pressure of hisfingers against the keys. This feature of Leonardo's instrument is of inestimableimportance; the harpsichord, the keyboard instrument closest to the present sketchin general shape and construction, with strings running back from the player andeach sounding their full length or one tone, n as incapable of providing the increaseor decrease of tone-volume through the varying of finger pressure. In theharpsichord these dynamic variations could be achieved only by pulling a stop andthus bringing into play one or more additional sets of strings. The clavichord, theonly other contemporary instrument with a keyboard, permitted some dynamicshading through its tangent action on the strings, but it had an incomparably smallertone than that of the harpsichord of Leonardo's time. The modern pianoforte,which, as its name reveals, permits dynamic shading (through hammer action onthe strings by means of finger pressure on the keys), was invented only in the earlyyears of the eighteenth century.

All construction sketches for the viola organista with an endless bow examinedin the preceding pages are from MS H (28r, 46r, 45v). The last one (+s

") may beprofitably compared with a sketch in CA 213 va (illus. 8.r8 and 8.r9), although 45 vrepresents the most unified and "logical" solution, whereas CA z4 va presentssome difficult puzzles. There is, however, a close relation between the drawing of

8.r8. CA zr3 va. Construction details fora viola organista.

8.r9. Detail of illus. 8.r8.

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8.2o. MS H ro4v. Drawing fora compactform of the viola organista.

the endless bow and the push-button machinery in both; also, both show a foot leverfor tuming the machinery that operates the spindles moving the archetto. Thereeven seem to be several archetti, and a very large flywheel. Many details in CA zr3va, however, are so imcomplete or blurred that an interpretation cannot reach anexact and a comprehensive level.

Manuscript H ro4 v (illus. 8.zo) shows a compact conoidal form of the violaorganista, perhaps for an itinerant musician in pageants, processions, or stage per-formances; in front the driving lever is visible, with rollers and center wheel showingthe path followed by the archetto infinito. At the top of the page is a diagram of themachinery moving the archetto.

CA l+ rb (illus. 8.zr) is filled with sketches of musical instruments and theiressential elements, no fewer than nineteen in number. Unfortunately the page isbadly mutilated; its left margin, which included parts of drawings and of verbalexplanations, is missing.

The most complete sketch of a whole instrument is at the bottom center. Themassive case is nearly triangular, with something like a keyboard on its top. The case

is to be attached to the chest of the player by a complex arrangement of fleather?]belts, probably to keep the player's hands free for touching the keys or pushinglevers. There are wide openings for the hips and legs of the player. The distancebetween the chest and the sound box is maintained by a vertical metal stick and foursmaller horizontal sticks (see the hinges).

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Nothing in this sketch reveals the inner mechanism, the method of setting thestrings into vibration, or the existence of an archetto infinito, and we cannot find thisinformation in the two other triangular instruments, one to the left of the first, andthe other a little higher on the left edge of the page. But we can infer just suchinformation from the large drawing that reaches from the right lower corner towardthe center of the page. There a large stick with a curved handle, probably a foot orknee lever, conveys motion over two spindles to a master wheel, from there to otherspindles, and, one could guess, to a belt vibrating the strings under the illustratedkeyboard. If this is only guesswork we receive clear information from the precisesketch in the lower center of the page. Here the same stick and master wheel directthe belt over the upper horizontal side of the triangular sound box to set the stringsinto vibration. Thus this belt could not have a function other than that of an archettoinfinito.

The reader must keep in mind that here Leonardo does not sketch for publica-tion but for his own memory. When he indulges himself, with pen in hand, in theanatomy of new machines, he does not always feel obliged to show several aspects

or views of the same object in strict perspective but while illustrating sometimesexpands or varies the main idea of the machine from picture to picture. Whilesearching, he widens the field of research.

The upper half of the page shows a rich assortment of machine parts, allbelonging to the viola organista. Some supplement one another; others are slightlydifferent versions of one another. A detailed description and analysis as well as areconstruction of all alternative versions n,ould amount to a technical monographbeyond the limits of this book and, in a n,ay, to a verbalization of the constanthypothetical conversation of Leonardo h'ith himself and his simultaneous rapidsketching.

8.22. Lower part of page, Madrid MS IIfolio 76 r, with sketches for a

simplified version of the viola or-ganista (see illus. ro.8 for a whole

Page)'

a6o STRING INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGA}iISTA

A page from MS II 76 r, National Library, Madrid (illus. 8.zz), includes tryodifferent simple sketches of the viola organista. In the upper sketch we have aschematic front view of the instrument that we have seen in H 45 v (p. ,yr). Sixteenstrings are now represented by sixteen dots as seen in cross section. Two interactingcogwheels move the right wheel of the two that tum the archetto. The cogwheels intum must receive their impulse from some source of energr' (mechanical or handmotion of the player or his assistant). We have seen such devices for the violaorganista in H 45 v and other pages.

The lower sketch differs from the upper one in several respects. It indicatesonly eleven dots for strings; beneath the dots is written oiola a fasfi (keved viol). Theleft wheel is much smaller and, above all, the device for driving the right wheel isdifferent. Instead of two cogwheels, here only a segment of one is visible; it isoperated by a lever with a handle inscribed gomito. The use of this rvheel segmentdoes not permit a continuous rotary movement of the archetto in one direction butfacilitates only a forward and backward movement comparable to that of the actualbow of a viol or any other bowed instrument. All these features point to a smallerand simpler version of the viola organista, and probably to a portable version.

As we have seen, Leonardo used the human body as the source of energy forall the string instruments previouslv examined, through the motion of a foot, thechest, or an elbow setting a flr.wheel into motion, which in tum sets the endless bowrotating. There is, however, one exception. In B 5o v we find a clockwork operatingan endless bow (illus. 8.r:).11 The clockwork with metal springs appears to beimpractical. Metal springs have their caprices-they act strongly at first and thengradually lose power until the exhaustion point. To counteract this disadvantageand to achieve a smooth and an even motion of the archetto, Leonardo evidentlysearched for a more reliable device. His solution is shown in the left upper corner ofB5ov.

Before studying the entire machine, we should turn to the text-the mostelaborate and revealing among all the pages dealing rvith the viola organista:"Questo e il modo del moto dello archetto della viola organista e se farai le crene dellarota de z tempi che siano minori l'una quantita de denti che l'altra e che non sischontrino insieme chome apare in a. b. sara all'archetto uno (cho) equate movimentose non e andra a schosse esse farai a mio modo la rochetta f. senpre andera equale."A free translation follows: "This is the wav the motion works of the violaorganista. If one makes the notches to respond not to the same time but to twodifferent times, so that one set of teeth is smaller in number than the other [on theopposite side of the wheell, and the teeth [on the left] do not correspond [the teethon one side of the wheel not projecting on the same level as those on the oppositesidel as it appears in a. b., the archetto will have an even motion while otherwise itwould run in jerks. But if you make it in my way the spindle f. witl turn evenly."

tr. I am fully aware of the fact that by general consent MS B dates earlier than the other codicesdiscussed in this chapter. Nevertheless I preferred discussing this page from MS B here at the end ofthis chapter because it concerns an auxiliary mechanism which can be better understood after discus-sion of the instruments designed in the others.

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8.23. MS B 5o v. Sketch of driving mechanism of the viola organista.

762 STRING INSTRUMENTS A\D THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

This text contains some unclear or at least ambiguous passages which I believebecome clearer through the study of the drawing, *rlhi.h iiself ii only a rapid em-bodiment of the basic idea, leaving some important detail open. Thus we muit makethe best of the situation and try to understand the dran-ing and its verbal explana-tion, each in the light of the other.

The archetto della uiola organista, thatis, the unending bon', is seen at the top ofthe drawing. It runs over two rolls of which the right-hand one is connected to alower cylinder just above the large, toothed wheel (marked "a" and "b"). It ismarked "f" inthe drawing, and is called "rochetta" (roll, or spindle) in the text. Thesource of motive Power is indicated in the lower left corner of the drawing: a round.box from which a cord comes and is wound over a horizontal cone. This cone isknown as a fusiel2 (from the medieval fusus, fusella, or fusata); it is a form of spindleused in machines driven by spiral springs. When the spring uncoils, its pullgradually decreases; the cord pulled by the spring is wound around the fus6e pullingfirst its thin end with small leverage effect, and proceeding graduallv to the wideend, thus counteracting the decrease of the force and producing an even drive. Theuse of the fus6e in our drawing indicates that the cylindrical box or barrel in thedrawing does not represent a weight, that time-honored source of motion for clocksand other mechanisms, but is rather an encased spring. This assumption is alsosupported by the four similar barrels in the lower drawing on the same page. Theyare all connected with fusees, and there the text expressly mentions "4 molli perl'oriolo" (four springs for the clock). They are staggered in an ingenious way so thatthe first of the springs, after uncoiling sets into motion the next one, and so forthuntil the last one has unrvound itself. Although the text13 does not mention anyapplication of this combined spring device to musical machines, it would of coursebe possible and would give the player a much longer time before he had to rewindthe spring.

The arbor (axle) of the fus6e carries also a large spoked wheel, which againdrives another spoked rvheel, probably by means of a toothed drum attached to theuPPer wheel. This device would impart to the upper rvheel a much greater speed ofrevolution than that of the first wheel. The second u'heel shares its arbor with theindented wheel, rvhich shows only its broad rim in the drawing. It is the indentedwheel whose teeth ("crene" and "denti") are mentioned in the text. These tooth-likeprojections on either side of the broad rim are not placed symmetrically but ondifferent levels. The letters "a" and "b" in the drarving make it clear that a tooth onone side corresponds to a recess or indentation on the other.

To understand this asymmetry we must undertake a little digression into the

rz. I do not knorv of any earlier representations or descriptions than this. A. Lloyd, in Chats onOld Clocks ([New York, ry52), p.4o), considers it possible that the fus6e, employed in r!25 in an extantmetal clock made by Jacob Zech in Prague, was inspired by Leonardo. However this may be, the fus6eappears not only in MS B 5o v but also in several other drawings of Leonardo.

r3. Text for the drawing of the four cones, or fes6es, in MS B 50 vi " 4 molli per l'oriolo, checquando l'una a ffinito suo corso, l'altra comincia. E nel voltare che fa la prima, la seconda sta ferma, ella prima si ficca a vite su la seconda e cquando e ttutta ficta, Ia seconda molla piglia iI medesimo moto; ecosi fanno tucte."


8.24. Escape mechanism of a clock withcrorvn wheel (diagram by the au-thor).

escape mechanism of clocks, particularly what is called the crown wheella or escapewheel, and the verge (also called "balance staff ," or simply "tod") (illus. 8.24). Thepull of the weight or of the coiled spring in the clock mechanism would create a rapidmotion of the wheels unless it was retarded. This can be achieved by attaching, tothe arbor of one of the vertical wheels of the clock, another wheel with ratchet-shaped teeth. Near this "crown-wheel" a vertical rod is held so that it can turn backand forth. For this purpose it is equipped rvith two projecting plates, the pallets, oneon top and one down below usually at an angle of about roo degrees to the top one.These pallets engage alternately with the teeth of the crown wheel. The upper palletreceives a thrust from one of the teeth and turns the verge in one direction, where-upon the lower pallet receives a thrust in the opposite direction and turns the vergeback. The result is a continuous swinging back and forth of the verge, permitting theteeth of the crown wheel to slip by one by one and thus to provide a slow and regularmotion of the crown wheel. The verge carries a crossbar with a weight on either end,thus increasing the inertia of the verge. The weights can be shifted toward the vergeor away from it, to regulate the speed of its oscillation and therefore of the wholeclock.

Clocks with this verge escapement existed before Leonardo, who must havebeen familiar with this device. In the beautiful intarsias made by the school of FraGiovanni da Verona about r5oo for the choir stalls of Monte Oliveto, south of Siena,which I visited some years ago in order to photograph the numerous musical in-struments represented there, I found a depiction of a large clock with crown wheeland verge clearly delineated (illus. 8.rS).

The verge escapement in its traditional form, however, would not have beenserviceable for Leonardo's idea of an unending bow. As we have seen, the verge

14. The picturesque Italian term for a wheel with such projections is ruota Caterina.

a6j


moves back and forth in little jerks; the crown wheel, although it revolves in onedirection, does so in little leaps whenever one of its teeth is released by one of thepallets of the verge. Neither type of motion provides the constant pull needed foruninterrupted bowing of the strings of a musical instrument. And here is whereLeonardo's mechanical inventiveness provided an answer.

He retained the verge mechanism to retard the wheels, but at the same time hetransformed it by thickening the crown wheel and equipping it w,ith teeth on eitherside that project asymmetrically, as he explained in his text. Instead of one verge,Leonardo uses two, furnishing each with one pallet only. In the drawing the vergeon the right side has its pallet on the bottom, and the other on the top. A singleverge, with one pallet only, would of course have no retarding effect because itwould spin in one direction with rapidly increasing speed. Not so with two verges,as drawn in Leonardo's sketch. They cooperate to provide retardation: since oneverge has its pallet high and the other is low, both revolve in the same direction andtum the two horizontal wheels, left and right of the spindle "f ," of which they are thearbors. These wheels then, by means of engaging teeth (not drawn in the sketch),impart to "f" that constant motion used for the unending bow, which is drawn ontop with its right roll directly connected to "f."

As we pointed out at the beginning of this chapter, an instrument controlling amultitude of bowed strings by only the ten fingers of one player must have been adream of imaginative instrument builders for centuries. Such an instrument wouldnot have been merely a counterpart of the organ, where ten fingers control numer-ous pipes, but would have surpassed the organ in one significant aspect: that is, inthe flexible dynamics permitting the fine gradation of volume. (The "swell" wasinvented for harpsichords only in ry69 and then, later, adapted for organs). InLeonardo's viola organista the finger pressure on the keys would have also modifiedthe loudness of the tones producedby single strings so that, for example, one middlevoice could have been dynamically emphasized such as we are able to do today onthe pianoforte. But again, even the pianoforte would have been inferior to the violaorganista in one regard. The striking of the hammers produces a tone that im-mediatelybegins to fade away or, as Leonardo says in the Paragone, "muoie durantela nascita," whereas the borved strings of the viola organista would produce tonesthat crescendo and decrescendo but do not die awav.

How vivid the dream must have been appears from the fact that from thesixteenth century until the time of the French Encylopedie, keyboard instrumentswere constructed, or rather, invented and re-invented. In r58r Vincenzo Galilei, inhis Dialogo . . . della musica antica, et della modertla, published in Florence, mentions akeyboard instrument with bowed strings in fact, as he says, like an "ensemble ofviols."1s In 1618 Michael Praetorius devoted a whole chapter in his Syntagma

15. Vincenzo Galilei, Dialogo della Musica Antica et Moderna (Florence, r58r), p. 48.

"Strumento di tastimolto artificioso ebello. Un'altro esempio d'uno Strumento di tasti, che gidl'Elettore Augusto Duca di Sassonia, dond alla felice memoria del Grande Alberto di Baviera, mi

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8.25. Clockwork with escape mechanism. From the intarsias in the choir stalls of MonteOliveto, by Fra Giovanni da \ierona.

-------


Musicum, lr, "De organographia." and a beautiful woodcut (see illus. 8.9), to the"Geigenwerck-Geigen Instrument, oder Geigen Clavicvmbel." rn t6z5 FrayRaymundo Truchado built his instrument with four friction rvheels. In Italy also thedream must have lingered on. An official inventory of the )v{edici Collection (23Sept. t7t5) of musical instruments included an instrument rvith fir'e wheels which,according to the short description given there, must have been a Geigenwerk.16Oddly enough this fact has never been noted in the organological literaturelT andthis is especially strange because it was this inventory which rt'as signed by Bar-tolommeo Cristofori, the inventor of the pianoforte, when he was appointed keeperof the Medici Collection. There are certainly good reasons for assuming that thisinstrument, which must have permitted crescendos and diminuendos by fingerPressure, played a role in Cristofori's invention of the pianoforte, u-hose hammeraction made possible the gradation of tone volume by finger pressure.

But it has never been discerned that Leonardo was the first to realize thisdream and arrive, after wrestling with various tentative constructive schemes, at apractical solution or, at least, a skeleton for a workable instrument. One is temptedto imagine the Magus putting together a real instrument in Milan or perhaps later inthe laboratory given to him by Pope Leo X in the Belvedere behind St. Peter's. Thatno real instrument has survived to our dav does not mean that he did not build one.Musical instruments are fragile-their soundboards, of necessity, are made of softwood and easily warp, bend, or crack under the tension of the strings and changes inhumidity and temperature. And if they are not played and cared for continuously,

sowiene in questo proposito, piu di ciascuno altro efficace, il quale Strumento ha le corde secondo l'usodi quelle del Liuto, e vengano secate d guisa di quelle della Viola da un'accomodata matassa ar-tifitiosamente fatta delle medesime setole di che si fanno le corde d gli archi delle Viole; la qualmatassacon assai facilitA, viene menata in giro con un piede da quello istesso che lo suona, e ne seca con-tinuamente col mezzo d'una ruota sopra la quale passa, quella quantita che vogliano le dita di lui, ilquale Strumento, due anni sono che io fui d quella corte, temperai secondo l'uso del Liuto, e facevadipoi ben sonato, non altramente che un corpo di Viole, dolcissimo udire."

lA Very ingenious and beautiful keyboard instrument. Another example of a keyboard instrumentwhich the Elector Augustus, duke of Saxony, presented to the late great Albert of Bavaria, occurs to mein this regard, better than any other. This instrument has strings similar to those of the lute and they arebowed like those of a viola bv a strand made ingeniouslv of the same hairs of which are made the hair ofviola bows. This strand can very easily be made to revolve by the foot of the player and strikes (bows),by means of a wheel over rvhich it passes, the number of strings rvanted by the fingers of the player.When I visited that court two years ago, I tuned this instrument in lute-like fashion and n'hen wellplayed it produced the srveetest sound, not different from an ensemble of Viols.l

The most telling word in this description is matassa, which means also the skein of varn held byone Person as it is being wound, and it therefore describes accurately the position of the belt orunending bow of Leonardo's instrument, particularly as it is shown in MS B 5o v.

16. The description of the instrument: "Un Cimbalo con' tastafura d'avorio, con' invenzione dicinque Ruote per toccar le corde di budella ad'uso d'una ghironda, tinta di rosso, e filettato d'oro, con'riquadrati copti di dommasco rosso, con' suo piede iniagliato, tinto color' sim., e dorato, con' suasopracopta di corame fod.a di tela, seg. N. 29."

r7. Curt Sachs, in his Real-Lexikon der Musikinstrumente (Berlin, r9r3), gives the most completelisting of wheel instruments of this sort after Truchado (under the heading "Streichklavier," p. 36ob).

STRINC INSTRUMENTS AND THE VIOLA ORGANISTA

they soon fall prey, as Leonardo said, to that great consumer-Time. As any con-noisseur of the history of instruments knows, many instruments and even wholecollections have disappeared without a trace, and old treatises and illustrations,even as late as the Baroque, tell us of instruments of which not a single specimen hassurvived.

a67

CHAPTER NINE

Melodic and Chordal Druffis,Other N[embr anophon es,

and Tunable Rells

Leonardo was greatly interested in the construction of drums. Not onlv did he try toimprove their playing technique but he expanded their musical possibilities, such as

the range of tones, far beyond the limitations of the conventional instruments of histime. He also gave some thought to the mechanization of militan' drums, rvhich isnot strange if one recalls his interest in devising tools of war from small daggers to

gigantic war machines and battlements.The following pages in his notebooks contain sketches of drums:CA ISS rc: 3ag rb; 3o6 va;Arundel 263 (BM) 47 \';775 t.CA ISS rc: This large page (illus 9.r) shows three instruments. The ones at the

left and at the bottom are onlv faintly visible: at the left we see an instrument withseven strings, by its shape vaguely related to the hurdr'-gurdy (ghironda).

Keyboards are placed not only at the side of the neck but also appear strangely at the

sides of the body. The function of such keys, if they are kevs at all, remains mysteri-

ous since such a large number of keys does not seem to correspond to the much

smaller number of strings.The faint sketch at bottom of the page represents a sei of twelve small kettle-

drums graduated in size. Simple as this sketch is, it clearlv indicates Leonardo's idea

of utilizing the drum as a melody instrument, that is, employing drums for produc-ing all the tones of the scale and thus radically exceeding the role of the drum as

primarily a reinforcement of rhythm.The large drar,r,ing on our page represents, in accurate detail, a large kettle-

drum with the usual screws placed near the rim of the skin, to tighten the latter fortuning. The three beaters are operated by a cogwheel, which is turned bv a crank.

A somewhat similar kettledrum of a shallower profile and with no screws is

reproduced in Madrid folio 16o r. A crank turns a rylinder whose projections lift fourbeaters (illus. 9.2).

Codice Atlantico 3ry rb (illus. 9.3) shows, besides a number of drawings notrelated to drums, eight sketches of drums. All these concern drums which are drivenautomaticatly by the wheels of their carriages. There are five side views of mechani-

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9.2. Madrid MS I folio 16o r. Mechanizedkettledrum.

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A72 DRUMS/ MEMBRANOPHONES, AND TUNABLE BELLS

cal drums, one schematic sketch in front view (bottom of the page), and two dia-grams showing the wheels and axle of the carriage. The five side views representslightly different versions of the same principle: the axle of the carriage wheel drivesa central cogwheel, or pinion wheel, and this in turn, through other cogwheels orpinion cages, activates the beaters. In detail, the upper left sketch shows a side drumwith four beaters which are moved in turn by the pins of a horizontal wheel. Thesketch to right of it is a cylindrical drum in vertical position, r.r,ith its skin on top, andthe beaters work by a large vertical pinwheel. The sketch immediately beneath itwavers between two ideas: the cylindrical drum in side or vertical position.

The drawing beneath the center of the page is more detailed: here the cog-wheel between the two carriage wheels engages two horizontal cogrvheels evidentlyto beat both sides of the side drum.

The last detailed drawing (middle bottom) seems to employ pinion cages inplace of cogwheels. The use of beaters on both sides is also clearly indicated in thefrontal sketch in the lower right corner of the page.

Codice Atlantico 3o6 va (illus. 9.+) is clearly a detailed and slightlv modifiedversion of the sketch in CA 3ry rb beneath the center. Here the drum has a snare andfive beaters. The teeth of the central vertical n'heel engage rvith vertical rods of twoside cylinders, whose upper surface carn' several oblique ron's of pins, which inrapid succession lift the levers that move the beaters. A crank protruding from one ofthe carriage wheels indicates that the n'hole machinery could be operated by hand ifthe carriage was not in motion.

Before turning to an analvsis of Leonardo's new ideas for the construction ofmelodic and chordic drums (Arundel 263 @M) r37 v anda75 r; CA 355 rc), it will benecessary to inquire into the general state of drum construction in Leonardo's time,especially the form and function of kettledrums, which were the noblest and mostelaborate members of the drum family. Only against this background will it bepossible to judge the novelty of Leonardo's inventions and, in some cases, even toarrive at a reasonable interpretation of his sketches.

Small kettledrums, always used in pairs, entered the Occident from the IslamicNear East at the time of the Crusades and gradually became indispensable in martialmusic togetherwith their inseparable companions, the trumpets. Large kettledrumscame to Central Europe and Italy during the fifteenth century from the Turkishempire. They could be tuned by tuming the screws one after another, which thusincreased the tension of the skin (illus. 9.5).

The simplest and most obvious device to employ drums for playing a scale or achord is to use a whole set of gradated drums. I have already mentioned one ofLeonardo's sketches of this invention when I discussed CA tss rc, a set of small,gradated kettledrums. Another similar sketch is found in a corner of Arundel 263(BM) 136 r (illus. 9.6), which is chiefly devoted to a wheel of pipes for producingmusical canons (this will be discussed later tp. rgrl). However, in the upper leftcorner of this page a little diagram shows five bowl-shaped drums of increasingsizeattached by stems to a common base. Two beaters are indicated, one at left and oneat right. The text explains: "tanpa nj sona ti co me ilmo na cordo ovei dolce mele

llirpaurhrtr f,rurri,: i: usi$ rflrrl r Bafirhlln

gjtt', Uo*teu ofl-Trb wir fyc ost l.a,nii i:rm:l2rff uil * ruiiroe bcr llrsenr f69niri, *ot kwen / 5 cnlracb iir unb tt c r i *t / \ ana n b e :h t,.ci cn in b er ctiftcrn 6ielfilefen/tirflublcrenAnb3ribetenf2.lii : rj.,riricl;glarrb r,r'bbalresfirr'uarbcricilfetbabbreerbacbrunbgemEcbtbc*.;:sAlrt:fcrr brtifcligteit/nocb.g&rebcrmaft/(vnbet einuertcmpfung /vnnb r:ra nybcr rucir:rg allcc liffentnitobeycnonb 0rr gc ngen $fi afrr,a i I erunb icb :uot gcacb tor tan i bae bl E y mp enff uilcynarrbsrbitrg rnrlfgewe(enfcinlboorrau3f,tbrerr !i6,4igtrttcogcbr*pcb thatt/b*rr ye6 pnf$ Basdrttsffis$t pct,,rrlprsb bcs ruiu on billicb bcn nanren b?tirfelitch cnw/llwmsnt3 fi g r&trlb ao b u cb rrit nirbig i{i }fl 0a @rrlica }rl &resa

9.5. Pair of kettledrums and two c'Iindrical cruns. From Virdung, Musica getutschf, Basel, t5rr.

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9.6. Arundel 263 (BM) 136r. Detail: setofgradated, small kettledrums withbeaters.

474 DRUMS, MEMBRANOPHONES, AND TUNABLE BELLS

9.7. Monochord. The two stopping bridges permit two tones to be produced simul-

taneously on a single string. woodcut from Lodor.ico Fogilano's Musica theoica

a529.

[timpani sonati come il monacordo ove il dolcemele] lkettledrums Played like aclavichord or dolcimelel."

My translation of monacordo br' "clavichord" requires a justification. In the

fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the word monocordo (also u'ritten monacordo or

manicordo) was used for tn'o different instruments: (r) the monochord, that venera-

ble sound box with one or more strings, used for studying the numerical ratios of

stopped strings (illus. 9.7), and (z) the clavichord, which had a larger number of

strings stretched over an oblong sound box, and a set of kevs that had little flat

upright metal plates (tangents) inserted at their rear ends to strike at the same time to

stop the strings. The clavichord was already fashionable before Leonardo's time (see

illus. 8.r3). It was also sometimes called manicordio, the u'ord based in free associa-

tion on monocordo but alludin g to mano ("hand").The dulce melos was another contemporary keyboard instrument, of square

shape with jacks standing freely on the rear end of the keys. These jacks had brass

hooks that struck the strings when the keys were pressed.l At any rate, Leonardo

meant to compare his set of drums with a keyboard instrument because the latter

could produce melodies and chords.Arundel z5f (BM) r75 r (illus. 9.8) contains three groups of sketches and obser-

vations. One concerning theoretical mechanics, specifically gravitation and the be-

havior of weights, 2 fills the top and the upper right of the page. The lower part of the

r. The first description of the dulce melos is found in a fifteenth century Latin manuscript in the

Bibliothdque Nationale in Paris. Botte de Toulmon first brought attention to it in his Dissertation sur les

instrumenis de musique au moyen-age (Paris, 1844), comparing it to a pianoforte. Curt Sachs gave a more

convincing description of it in his History ot' Musical lnstruments (New York, ag4o), P. )$.z. See the transcription of these purrug"r in Arturo Uccelli, Leonardo da Vinci: I Libri di Meccanica

(Milan: Hopl| r94o), p. zo.

VNICA Cl{O DA QVA SO}t[ CVrySLISET CONSONANTIE SIUVL AVDIRI POSflTNT .

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a76 DRUMS, MEMBRANOpHONES, -{ND TUNABLE BELLS

Page shows eight sketches for the construction of keyboards for ivind instruments.3The rest of the page, that is, the upper left half and center, deals n,ith drums, and tothis section belongs also the large chordal drum with beater in the lower rightsection.

The eleven drum sketches represent an astonishing r-arieh' in aim and con-struction. I should like to point out here, before detailed interpretation, that thesequence from top to bottom is not haphazard; the drawings are not isolated aperEusbut instead seem to follow a methodical order progressing from group to group,each group dealing with a different problem. Thus I will take them up i. *y analysisfrom top to bottom and reflect on the method of the grouping at the end of ouranalysis.

9.8A. .{rundel z5i (BM) t75 r. Detall.

9.8A: The body of the drum is clearly a cylindrical snare drum. The problembegins with the indented line vertically crossing the skin, and the concentric clusterof black lines on the left from rthich a crank evidently protrudes. Leonardo's expla-nation says: "tamburo di tacche fregate da rote di molle" (at least this is the diploma-tic translation in the facsimile edition of 1923, edited bv Danesi). In English thiswould be: "A drum with (a device of) notches scraped bv a n'heel of springs." Withthe word tacche Leonardo probably indicates a small board n'ith many little saw-likeindentations. The rote ditnolle is probably not a wheel in the strict sense of this wordbut a number of flexible metal sticks arranged like the spokes of a wheel. It ispossible, however, to read roti instead of rote and to translate it "fragments" (orlittle pieces) of springs. The protruding crank is unmistakable, but the way in whichthe cluster of springs is attached to the drum is not evident from the drawing.

What, then, is the meaning of the whole? Leonardo's explanation gives thetechnical ingredients of the mechanism, not its purpose. We probably have here a

combination of a scraper action (that is, the springs beating against the indentationsof the saw) with a cylindrical drum functioning mainly as a resonator or soundreinforcement. The whole achievement then would be moderate: a different timbreand a sort of mechanization through crank action but no revolutionary inventionsuch as we will find in the following sketches.

3. Analyzed on p. 193.

DRUMS, ]V{EMBRANOPHONES/ AND TUNABLE BELLS a77

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9.88. Arundel 253 (BM) r75 r. Detail.

9.88: This sketch is of incomparably greater importance and novelty than A.Leonardo says: "tamburo quadro del quale si tira e allenta la sua carta colla lieva ab"(square drum whose skin is tightened and slackened by means of the lever ab).

The drum, that is, its bodv----contrary to Leonardo's words-is not square butits head is. The function of the tightening mechanism becomes clear if the reader's

eye separates the outer shape of the drum from the levers which look so:

If the player pushes asunder the ends at the right, perhaps rvedging a fist in be-

tween, the other ends open, scissor like, thus tightening the skin, while the otherhand is beating it. The result is that of a drum with pitch changeable during perfor-mance, something which the Occident did not know until the invention of the pedal

machine drum toward the end of the nineteenth century.a This latter inventionenabled the player to change the tuning so fast during performance that even a

melody of moderate tempo can be plaved.

9.8C. Arundel 263 (B\{) r75 r. Detail.

9.8C: Here the shape of the instrument is that of a kettledrum, which was wellknown to Leonardo. Small kettledrums, always used in pairs (naqqhrh, nacchere,

nacaires, nakerc) entered the Occident from the Middle East during the Crusades ifnot earlier. Large kettledrums (tympana) were known in Eastern Europe, especially

Hungary and Poland, as early as the fifteenth century. In r5n Sebastian Virdung, a

priest in Basel, complains in his Musica getutscht of the "horrible noise of these

4. German patent Apr. z, r88r (see Zeitschrift fiir Instrumentenbau XXlll (r9q): $6. West Africaand the Far East know the "hourglass drum," whose two skins are connected by extemal ropes whichcan be pressed by the player's arm or elbow to increase or decrease the tension of the skins and thereby

change the pitch during performance. It is, however, improbable that Leonardo knew this type of

drum.

a78 DRUMS/ MEMBRANOPHONES, AND TUNABLE BELLS

drums, which disturb the pious old people, the sick and the devout in the cloisters,who try to read, to study and to praf i'and considers them "an invention of thedevil, and the suppression of all sweet melodies."s

Virdung's illustration of the kettledrums (illus. 9.5) shon's a device which,according to all historic evidence, must have been quite novel at his time: there are

ten screws visible that can lower or raise the iron frame bv n'hich the skin isstretched, and thereby tighten or slacken the skin. None of Leonardo's drums has

this device. The present drum, like the ones in 9.8F and 9.8G shorv an earlier tighten-ing device, namely, laces. Cords like these either connect the two skins on oppositesides of a rylindrical drum, as for instance in 9.8G, or are slung from the rim of theskin around the body, as in kettle- or pot-shaped drums like 9.8C. For tuningpurposes this net of cords can be tightened but this of course takes some time, and a

quick change of skin tension during performance is out of the question.Leonardo's sketch shows an extraordinary feature: the cords running from the

circular frame of the drum are not fastened to its round bottom but go beyond ittoward a sort of disk or ring to which we must suppose they are attaihed. From thiscontraption protrudes-drawn in Leonardo's inimitable shorthand iechnique-ascrew and a crank. The only interpretation that explains all these unusual features is

to consider them as a device that can, bv turning the crank, change the tension of allthe cords simultaneously and therebv change the pitch in a minimum of time. Onsuch a drum, any melody could be plaved by appropriate manipulation of the crank.

This invention, whether Leonardo knerv the hoop-tightening scrervs depicted inVirdung or not, goes far bevond Virdung's device and in fact anticipates the latest

development of the modern pedal-tuned timpani or machine drum of the modernorchestra, which dates back no earlier than the middle of the nineteenth century.The screws on the Virdung instrument could be turned onlv one at a time and

therefore would permit onlv slow tuning. As pointed out above, not until the pedalmachine drum of the nineteenth century was a quick, simultaneous tightening of allthe screws on the hoop made possible.

In sketch 9.8C, which we are discussing here, the drum apparently rests on a

stand; the player could not hold the drum because both his hands were engaged,

one in turning the crank and the other in beating the drum. Thus, the presence of a

stand would support the assumption that the crank serr es to tighten the laces ratherthan activate a beating mechanism.

It seems appropriate here to at least mention a different interpretation. Onemay perhaps consider the crank a device for beating the skin in some way from the

inside of the body, and there are three sketches where cranks are.used to set the

beaters or beating springs into motion: 9.8A, 9.8E, and 9.8H.u But in all these

sketches the connection with the beaters is obvious and the beaters are clearly

5. Sebastian Virdung, Musica getutscht und ausgezogerz (Basel, r5rr), p. 25.

6. The study of cranks in Leonardo's machines is rewarding beyond their use in musical in-

struments, for they function only if tumed counterclockwise, that is, as a left-handed Person would

turn them. This fact alone would have been a decisive argument in the controversy raging for genera-

tions about the reasons why Leonardo used mirror writing.

DRUMS/ MEMBRANOPHONES/ AND TUNABLE BELLS a79

drawn. Moreover, in sketch 9.8C the crank is attached to a screw which would allowonly slorv tuming as required for tightening, and not for rapid beating. Finally,sketch 9.8C appears as one in a row of five drums (9.8B-9.8F), which all aim at aworkable solution of changing pitch during performance.

r'---*#i

9.8D and 9.88. Arundel 263 @M) r75 r. Detail.

Sketch 9.8D is one of the most original solutions of the problem of obtaining a

series of different tones from a drum while beating it. Here a snare drum with a long,nearly cylindrical body on a stand has several side holes in flute fashion. Beforefinally convincing myself that the little circles indicate holes, I decided to experimentand had built a little wooden tube rvith a skin on one opening and several side holes.The closing of the various holes u'hile beating the skin results in clear pitch dif-ferences, and one wonders why in primitive music or for children's toys such a"flute drum" was never used.

Sketch 9.8E shows a square box with a ratchet wheel worked by a crank. Theseveral slightly curved lines on top of the upper side of the box seem to indicatespringy tongues attached at one end to the surface of the box while the free end islifted in quick succession by the spokes of the wheel, to snap back against thesurface. The way in which the wheel is attached to the box is not shown unless one ofthe lines just mentioned indicates such a connection.

The unusual feature of this instrument is the flat oblong board on its right side,which is softly shaded while the square above it is strongly shaded. The board is, inmy belief, a slide and the square above it a hole which can be opened or closed bymoving the slide. The purpose would again be to obtain a change in pitch duringplaying. To verify my interpretation I again built a model whose performance fullycorroborated my assumption. Notice also the little projections on the bottom end ofthe slider, which can hardly be anything else than loops or handles for moving theslide.

There is still the question of whether this instrument is a "drum" in the strictsense of this term, that is, an instrument with a membrane. We must rather assume

that its upper surface is of wood since only this would provide the right basis for thespringy tongue of the ratchet mechanism.

. .....r.. r. rr. -..1 . !o. *,,,,,S,,$,,,,1'1;l;:,,i,:il i

18o DRUMS/ MEMBRANOPHONES, AND TUNABLE BELLS

9.8F and 9.8G. Arundel 263 (BM) t75 r. Detail.

The drum in sketch 9.8F is evidently based on the same principle as 9.8E: theslide action. Here the body is that of a conventional cylindrical drum n'ith laces. Theside hole and slide are on,top, and the right end of the slide again has some sort ofhandle for pulling. This drum has no mechanical beating machinery but an ordinarybeater.

The next sketch introduces a group of three drums (q.8G-9.8I) that are basedon another method of expanding the function of drums: the production of simul-taneous tones or chords by combining several drums into one compound instru-ment. Sketch 9,8G shows an instrument n'hich is a combination of a side drum withsnare, and several cones inserted into its base. Three cones are visible but it ispossible that there may be more, hidden behind. However, there are marks added atthe right of the cones that mav be the symbols for tones according to the Guidoniansystem of solmization, which designated the tones of the scale bv svllables such as utre mi fa sol la. This seems probable also from Leonardo's caption, "tanburo a con-sonanza," although one cannot help wondering why the cones meant to producedifferent tones are of approximately the same size. Different tones, to be sure, forexample, the tones forming a triad, could be produced bv different tightening of themembranes, assuming they were so equipped.

At any rate there cannot be any doubt that we har.e here a drum intended toproduce a chord. It is a pity, however, that the drawing does not give the faintestidea about the connection between the body of the drum and the cones, or whetherthe cones are open or closed at their wide end or perhaps at their small end, or howdeep they reach into the drum itself. There are several possibilities. (r) They may beopen at both ends. This possibility can be discarded: a model that I built does notsucceed in producing different tones. (z) They may be equipped with membranes ateither or both ends and therefore, in fact, be drums themselves.

Sketch 9.8H is another "consonance" instrument. The text says: "Urra tabellaa consonanza ciod 3 tabelle insieme." The body consists of three shallow boxes. Tothe upper left edge a ratchet mechanism is attached. A spindle turned by a crank isfumished with three sets of spokes that simultaneously operate springy tonguesbeating on the top of the three boxes. Thus this instrument was intended to producea chord of three tones. We do not see from the drawing whether this instrument has

tdt',q

,,tlil

,

/t--r" i '\>.

a{nrt""t $ *

DRUMS, MEMBRANOPHONES,

I ... .. rr.:

AND TUNABLE BELLS

9.8H. Arundel 263 (BM) a75 r. Detail.

membranes. If not, it would, like that in sketch 9.8E, not be a drum in the technicalsense of the word but an idiophone.

Still simpler in construction is the drum sketched at the lower right side of thepage (see illus. Z.g). At first glance there may seem to be six compartments on theright side as opposed to five on the left. Actually, there are five skins at the left whichbend around the edge of the whole box and are tied with cords around it. The textsays: "Si come un medesimo tanburo fa voce gravi e acute secondo le carte piir mentirate, cosi queste carte variamente tirate sopra un medesimo corpo di tanburo faranvarie voce [Since one and the same drum produces high or lou, tones according tothe tighter or looser stretching of the skin, so the present skins stretched at variousdegrees over the same body of a drum produce different tonesl." The instrumentclearly permits playing a scale.

The last two drawings of drums, sketches 9.8J and 9.8K, present greater diffi-culties to interpretation than ai1 the others. Both are evidently pot drums withdetachable drumheads and a mechanism inside to make them sound. No separatebeater is visible.

9.8J. Arundel 263 @M) r75 r. Detail.

In the upper drum 9.8J, what appears to be a lid or cover at the left (or upperend of the pot) is detached. whether this left end of the pot is simply open, orcovered by skin, cannot easily be decided. Since Leonardo uses shading for openholes such as in sketches 9.8E and 9.8F, we are inclined to interpret the round shape

18r

rt

DRUMS/ MEMBRANOPHONES, AND TUNABLE BELLS

at this end as a head affixed to the drum, in addition to the one which is removed. Inthe lower drum, the corresponding section is dark and thus, probably, an open hole.

Also difficult to explain are the curved lines at the right of the upper drum.They are likely to indicate a base or handle for holding the pot, or perhaps a devicefor activating the inner machinery. Since no outside beater or drum stick is illus-trated we must assume that it is the inner mechanism that beats the drum frominside.

0{}i9

f, , ,, &i €, -lria 'il9.8K. .{rundel 263 (BM) r75r.Detail.

The lower drum 9.8K, of a different and longer shape, also has a detachable

cover and an inner mechanism. The latter, in this case, is activated by a spoked

wheel outside, which is tumed by a crank. The ends of the wheel spokes beat against

two nearly parallel sticks or wires protruding from the pot. This dual number makes

one think that it is a dev.ice employed to tum the object inside the pot, which may be

a friction wheel. Problematic also is the line curving on the lower side of the drum,clearly outside it, extending from the frame of the spoked wheel toward a hook on

the rim of the pot.

9.9. From Virdung, Musica getutscht.

DRUM5. \TEMBRANOPHONES/ AND TUNABLE BELLS ag3

Althoueh this attempt at interpreting the drawings themselves remainsguessn'ork, \\'e may find relevant information in contemporary instruments ofLeonardo's time and recall certain folk instruments that show similarities to Leonar-do's pot drum. One is a scrap pot as we find it illustrated occasionally after r5oo inGerman literature. It is shown in Virdung (illus. 9.9), evidently copied from there inPraetonus, where neither name nor explanation is given except that in chapter xiii ofthe "De organographia" he refers to it by calling it a "Pritschen auf dem Hafen"(beater in the pot). It is also illuskated in a facetious set of "Musicians" by TobiasStimmer, where the last picture is that of an old woman playing the pot with a spoonending in a hook (illus. 9.ro). No treatise gives the name or an explanation of how it isplaved, but from Stimmer ive can safely conclude that the playing technique wasthat of scraping. The first two rhymes of the funny poem which accompanies thedrarving say:

Nimmer zergaht ein Spil ohn Narren.Drum muss ich auf dem Hafen scharren.

Never a play occurs without a fool, therefore I must scrape [scharren] the pot [Hafen].

There was also another folk instrument which combined pot and membraneand is so widely disseminated that it must have a very long historv. Its most famousillustration is found in a painting by Frans Hals (illus. 9.n); italso plays a prominentrole among the noisemakers in P. Breughel the Elder, The Combat between CarnipalandLent (illus. 9.rz). It is the Rommelpot, to use its Dutch name mentioned already inMersenne's Harmonie Uniuerselle (Paris fi36).In Provence it was known as the plg-nato, in Naples as the caccarella, and in Apulia as the cupacupa.

Leonardo himself designed a version of the Rommelpot in MS zqTBib. Nat. Cr (illus. 9.r3). His version shows not actuallv a pot but a cylinder possibly fashionedout of bark or covered with fabric. It is closed on one side by a membrane that may beof animal skin or an equivalent flexible material. This instrument occurs in manyversions in Europe and in the Orient. Some specimens have a stick or hollow reedattached to the center of the membrane. The stick is used either to set the membraneinto vibration or is itself vibrated by the wetted palm of the hand. Various substancessuch as wax or tar are used to create friction. A similar effect can be produced by anattached bunch of hair or rope, as shown in illustrationT.T4. The tone produced is ashrieking and, to most people, funny noise. In chapter 7I drew attention to Leonar-do's distinction among different kinds of noise such as tono, strepido, and. romore,and that romore (rumor), meaning an inarticulate tone, is represented by the vulgarnoise of the friction drum such as our Rommelpot. When Leonardo organized theFeste del Paradiso at the Castello Sforzesco in Milan in r49o he showed the caccarellaas the appropriate noisemaker for the twelve devils at the gate of hell.7

Immediately to the left of this Rommelpot Leonardo drew another instrumentthat is supposedly similar but with a very different function. A cylinder covered withfabric and tied at one end shows at the other end a cogwheel operated by a crank.

7. Seep.75.

rt

9.10. O1d woman with pot drum; n'ooci-cut by Tobias Stimmer, sixteenthcentury.

Frans Hals the Elder, The Rommel-pot Player. Richmond, CollectionSir Herbert Cook. 9.r2. Detail From P. Breughel the Elder,

The Combat beht'een Carniaal and

Leaf . Kunsthistorisches Museum,Vienna.

DRU}I 5

The cogshandle.

\T!\{BRANOPHONES, AND TUNABLE BELLS

:r:he ivheel produce a rattle-like noise; a roop of rope forms a carrying

185

9.r3. MS zo37Bib. Nat. C r.

Sketches such as the ones in Arundel 263 (BM) a75 r areinteresting because ofthe originality of Leonardo's inventions and the superb economy of his drawingtechnique; they permit a glimpse at his forma mentis. He begins his series of drumswith what n'as probably a passing idea: an unirsual tone color or rather noise colorfor a drum and a mechanical contraption for playing it. But then a whole flood ofnovel ideas is let loose, all going beyond existing devices. Leonardo endeavors toenrich the traditional function of drums br. making them capable of producingchords and scales' For this, he tries two different methods. One is the combination ofseveral drums or skins of different pitch into one single instrument. The otherconsists of devices to make one skin produce tones of different pitch in rapid succes-sion. This aim is realized by various methods: through the introduction oiside holes;through the use of scissor levers or screw devices to change the tension of the skinwhile it is beaten: through slides that open and close a large hole in the resonatingbody; or, finally, bv mechanisms that detach the skin .orr", from the body of a potdrum. Hardly an opportunity offered by nature is overlooked in this seriei of quickthough methodical sketches, jotted down on a page which began with quite adifferent subject-theoretical mechanics-and is going to wind up with n.* id.u,for wind instruments.

186 DRUMS, MEMBRANOPHONES, A\D TUNABLE BELLS

UNABLE BELLS

Madrid MS II folio 75 v shows in the upper right corner (illus. 9.74 abell rvith a widerim and no clapper inside. Two hammers strike the rim from opposite sides. To theleft of the bell there is a mechanism including what seems to be a set of four keysoperating on a tracker action ihat in its turn controls four levers that end in ovalheads. In my opinion these heads must be dampers. The accompanving text says:

"lJna medesima campana parranno essere quattro campane. Tasti d'organo, con lacampana ferma e battuta da due martelli. Ed avrd mutazione di voci, a similitudinedell'organo."8

Acoustically important in this explanation are the statements that the bell isfirm, neither swinging nor equipped with a clapper in the manner of a church bell,and that it produces "a change of tones," which is in all probabiLih'one of pitch, notof timbre. e Thus, Leonardo must have believed that the upper section of the bell has

ring-shaped areas that produce tones of different pitch if thev are slightly mutedwhen the rim is set into vibration by the hammers. I must, hou-ever, sadly add thatmy own experiments n'ith smaller and medium-sized bells in the MetropolitanMuseum's collection brought no conclusive results.

Hermann von Helmholtz, in his famous book Die Lehre rton den Tonempfin-dungen . . ., did not rule out at least the possibilitv of areas of a bell producing tones ofdifferent pitch.10 Anvhon', it is interesting that Leonardo, here, as in many other ofhis musical inventions, tried to obtain from one instrument what could normallyonly be produced b), several or a whole set of instruments.

8. "One and the same bel1 will appear to be four bells. Organ keys, with the bell stationarv andbeaten by two hammers. It rr'iil have a change of tones comparable to that of an organ."

9. Theoreticallvthechangeoftonescouldalsomeanchangeoftimbre;butthisisnotlikelv,sincea difference among these four kinds of timbre would be small, and also because Leonardo insists thathis invention enables the bell to do the job of four bells, implving probably that effect of a carillon.

ro. "Der stiirkste Ton ist nicht der tiefste; der Kessel der Glocken, angeschlagen, giebt tiefereTone als der Schallring, letzterer dagegen die lautesten. Uebrigens sind auch wohl noch andereSchwingungsformen der Glocke moglich, wobei sich Knotenkreise bilden, die dem Rande parallelsind, diese scheinen aber schwer zu entstehen, und sind noch nicht untersucht" (Die Lehre uon den

Tonempfindungen als Physiologische Grundlage fiir die Theorie der Musik,4th ed. [Braunschrveig, t877), p.ei.

9.r4. Madrid MS II, folio 75 v. Detail: bell rvith z hammers and a mechanism of 4 dampers

'r

CHAPTER TEN

Toys and Jolk lnstruments

In MS zqTBib. Nat. D r we find two adjacent leaves with curious drawings: some

folk instruments, some fantastic instruments. The bizarre goat-jaw instrument has

already been discussed in chapter 5 (illus. 5.r) as one example related to thecraniomania of the time. Related to it also seem to be the three strange bone daggersor knives (illus. ro.r). The two upper curved ones have handles in the shape of

ro.r. MS zo37Bib. Nat. D r. Two realisticpipes, one single and one double,and three bizarre bone daggers.

".,1l.\lr-I

;d3

a87

188 ToYS A\D FoLK INSTRUMENTS

animal horns, and one, even the whole neck of a goat; the lou'est one is nearlvstraight and is furnished with teeth of different shapes, lrom pr--rinted canine teeth torounded molars,l but one hesitates to identify the whole dagger as a jaw because itshandle with its two round bulbous projections resembles rather the upper end of thefemur. In short, here, as in the dran'ing of the goat skull rrith musical strings andfrets, Leonardo seems to have given free rein to his fantasy at its most playful.

The two wind instruments above the daggers are utterlv mvsterious. Theupper double pipes seem vaguelv to resemble an aulos (tibia in Latin). that famousdouble oboe of the ancients, which certainly must have been familiar to Leonardofrom many ancient sarcophagi and other Roman art depictions. But the aulos con-sisted of two tubes, each with an independent mouthpiece, whereas the presentpipes seem to converge toward one common mouthpiece. No finger holes are

marked.The other slightly curved instrument has a single pipe with the mouthpiece

indistinctly drawn. Also problematic are the six loops of string, each neatly tied.Distances between the loops are unequal and, at first glance, one mav be remindedof frets in a stringed instrumen! but we have here a wind instrument and, at anyrate, the distances do not correspond to the proportional arrangement one wouldexpect of frets. Moreover, there is no trace of finger holes, as, for instance, in a

cornetto.With so many questions open, one may perhaps best return to the assumption

that the pipes as well as the fanc' bore daggers were children of a momentary fancy,

and perhaps were meant to be used in some bizarre pageant, possiblv for allegorical

purposes, carried by satvrs or silens or other mythical creatures.

Quite different are the drawings in Arundel 263 (BM)136 r (illus. ro.z). The

most detailed drawing on this page is in the lower right comer. One distinguishesclearly a wheel or circle rvith a crank attached. The wheel, or rather the innermostcircle, has at its periphen' four teeth or cogs, and behind them, four sets each ofseven rods, probably of n'ood or cane. The circular lines behind these rods seem to

indicate their rotary motion through the air.Leonardo's text at the left of the drawing is as follon's:

Qui si fa una rota di m canne a uso di tabelle con un circulo musicale detto canone che si canta

a quattro che ciascun cantore canta tutta la rota e poi faccio io qui una rota con 4 denti che ogni

dente fa l'uffizio d'uno cantore.

It may be ren,arding to compare this drau'ing in the lower right corner withanother one near the center of the page, where the middle wheel is marked tabella.

We recognize in a sketchier way the four sets of rods in graduated lengths. Theirwidths are surprisinglv uneven; we also recognize the short teeth or cogs projectingfrom the middle wheel. There are, however, many more than the four clearly drawnin the lower drawing.

r. See Leonardo's drarving of various human teeth in F B 4k v, Windsor AN. B r9o58v (B4rv);

Charles D. O'Malley and J. B. Saunders, Leonardo da Vinci on the Human Body (New York: Henry

Schuman, 1952), i, p. 44.

DRUMS, MEMBRANOPHONES,

I ... .. rr.:

AND TUNABLE BELLS

9.8H. Arundel 263 (BM) a75 r. Detail.

membranes. If not, it would, like that in sketch 9.8E, not be a drum in the technicalsense of the word but an idiophone.

Still simpler in construction is the drum sketched at the lower right side of thepage (see illus. Z.g). At first glance there may seem to be six compartments on theright side as opposed to five on the left. Actually, there are five skins at the left whichbend around the edge of the whole box and are tied with cords around it. The textsays: "Si come un medesimo tanburo fa voce gravi e acute secondo le carte piir mentirate, cosi queste carte variamente tirate sopra un medesimo corpo di tanburo faranvarie voce [Since one and the same drum produces high or lou, tones according tothe tighter or looser stretching of the skin, so the present skins stretched at variousdegrees over the same body of a drum produce different tonesl." The instrumentclearly permits playing a scale.

The last two drawings of drums, sketches 9.8J and 9.8K, present greater diffi-culties to interpretation than ai1 the others. Both are evidently pot drums withdetachable drumheads and a mechanism inside to make them sound. No separatebeater is visible.

9.8J. Arundel 263 @M) r75 r. Detail.

In the upper drum 9.8J, what appears to be a lid or cover at the left (or upperend of the pot) is detached. whether this left end of the pot is simply open, orcovered by skin, cannot easily be decided. Since Leonardo uses shading for openholes such as in sketches 9.8E and 9.8F, we are inclined to interpret the round shape

18r

rt

L90 TOYS A\D FOLK INSTRUMENTS

Beneath this drawing \ve see an octagonalbarrel-shaped bodv, which must be

the steering mechanism. At least four teeth do project rrLrm it. but from adjacent

planes and at different distances from the end. One wonders rr-hether the two pieces

tf r.or" beneath represent the theme of the canon. It is interesrrnq that the lowest

score includes eight notes but in fact only four different pitches.

On top of the page we find a verv different instrument related only in some

regard to thl former two wheels. Like the wheels, it has a crank and. r'ery sketchily

drawn, the middle barrel with a number of teeth projecting in dilferent directions.

But this drawing does not show, rods of different shapes and irregular widths but

clearly large cylindrical pipes like organ pipes, which show that if Leonardo wanted

to draw hollow rods or pip"r or tubes, he could do this admirably u'ith a minimum of

lines. Although there is a crank, one should not assume that the pipes rvere to be

shifted by rotary motion to the lower side of the barrel, since the smallest pipe of the

lower set is beneath the longest of the upper set.

Returning now to Leonardo's text at the bottom of the Page, \\'e are now

prepared to examine the word channe. Whether we interpret Leonardo's channe as a

sotid or hollow object is central to our explanation because hollon' obiects would

function as pipes or tubes or, at anv rate, as n'ind instruments, ll'hereas solid things

would function only by vibrating rr'hen struck and, thus, as percussion instruments'

If we have pipes, the difficultv arises as to how wind is made to fill them-rotation of

the wheel may notbe sufficient, and no bellows are shown. The word channe means/

and meant at Leonardo's time, many different things, some hollo\\', some solid, and

some hollow but not throughout their whole cavity. Among hollorv things we find

pipes, such as organ pipes,lhe pastoral flute, a glassblower's tube, a gun barrel, the

irr*rr, windpipe, ur,drnur,r' others; on the other hand, channe often means solid

things such as u ttt',l.tg rod, a measuring rod, or a walking cane; finally, channe also

desi[nates slender stems such as shafts of grutt or bamboo sticks, $'hich are hollow

but with the cavity separated into several compartments closed by strong dia-

phragms. One could not make a flute out of bamboo n-ithout removing these

diaphragms.Th; two large, nearlv complete English translations of Leonardo's notebooks,2

]ean Paul Richterls The Liierary Works of Leonardo daVinci, published in r-8!3 and in a

second edition inry3g(London: Oxford Universitv Press), and Edward MacCurdy's

Tlre Notebooks of Leotinrdt', da Vinci, first published in r9o4 and then in expanded form

in r938 (London: Jonathan Cape), give remarkablv different translations of this text.

In his translation Richter avoids committing himself to wind or percussion

instruments and translates channe by the phoneticallv similar English wotd, cane'

The English cane,like the Italian channa, can mean both a pipe or a solid rod' But

Richter is not consistent, for his translation of tabelle as "clappers" suggests Percus-

sion. Here is his translation of the entire text: "Here there is to be a cylinder of cane

after the manner of clappers with a musical round called a canon, which is sung in

four parts; each singer il"gi"g the whole round. Therefore I here make a wheel with

4 teeih so that each tooth takes by itself the part of a singer."

z'BothpublishedlongbeforetherecoveryoftheMadridCodicesinry6T.

TOYS A\D FOLK INSTRUMENTS a9a

lUacCurdv takes sides uncompromisingly for the wind instrument by translat-ing channe as "pipes." yet, rather inconsistently, he suggests, like Richter, that theyserve as clappers. Is it possible that the centrai issue, iu-irrd o. percussion, has notbeen cleariv seen by both translators? This is MacCurdy,s translation: ,,Here youmake a r{heel with pipes that sen'e as clappers fo. a musical round called a canon,which is sung in four parts, each singer singing the whole round. And therefore Imake here a wheer with four cogs so that eacl cog may take a part of a singer,,(one-r-olume edition, p. ro5z).

\'ft' own translation is based on the unequivocal position of facing the issue ofwind or percussion, and Leonardo's clear distinction between the rods with irregu-lar shapes and widths in the two middle drawings compared to the precisely drawnpipes in the top drawing. My translation follows: ,,Here one makes a wheel of somanv rods to be used as sounding elements for a musical round called a canon,which is sung in four-part polyphony, each singer singing the r,r,hole round, and forthis I make a wheel with four cogs so that each iog rrr-r*""s the task of one singer.,,

By translating the word channe as "rods,', ihe problem is greatry simptifred.There would no longer be the question as to how the hollow channe could be filledwith wind' The rodswould simply be set into vibration by being hit in turn by thecogs. In short, the whole mechanism wourd be a version'of whlt toauy ir-.ui"a ,Swiss music box and could be classified as a merry toy for carnival or popularfestivities. 3

ro.3. Madrid MS I folio 9r v.Cylindrical snare drum operated bypinbarrel cvlinder.

Madrid MS I folio 9r v shows a sketch of three drums operated by a pin barrelcylinder (illus. ro.3). The drums are cylindrical, each one equipped with a snare.They differ in size: the diameter of the largest drum is three times that of the smallestdrum and twice that of the middle-sized one. The revolving cylinder, whose supportis not indicated, is equipped with projecting teeth that lift tle beaters. one beater forthe large drum and two for the middie-siz"d o.r" are clearly indicated. The smallestdrum also seems to have two beaters but this is not obvious from the drawing. Thepin barrel itself is set into motion by alarge, vertical master wheel with projeltionsgeared to the cylinder. The result which Leonardo must have had in mind was athree-part polyphony in elaborate rhyth_m, with the higher tones produced by thetwo smaller drums sounding more rapidly than the loi tones of tire large drum.

3' Carlo Pedretti kindly reminded me of the tabella di Marzocco mentioned by him in his Commen-tary on the Literary works.of Leonardo da vinci, p. 333, and, in his belief, related to ir," y"*ry Frorentinefestival of St' Giovanni Battista, using the traditionat carro di Marzocco, the wagon with the heraldic lion,the emblem of Florence. If Pedretti'i idea is correct, it would greatly support my hypothesis that thetabella con channe is a children's tov.

CHAPTER ELEVE\

Wind lnstruments:

The jlissando Jlute,Kty N[echanisms for Wind lnstruments,

and ,7{euc Rellows

In CA 3gZ ,b (illus. rr.r) we find, among numerous small sketches for various ma-

chinery, drawings of two pipes, evidently one of those countless passing ideas

which were crying to Leonardo to be recorded just here and no\4', so as not to be

forgotten in the perpetual flow of images, n'hims, and new ideas.

Every connoisseur of musical instruments will recognize immediately tworecorders (flauti dolci) by their characteristic heads and mouth holes. Their basic

structure has not changed substantiallv since Leonardo's time. Beneath the uPPer

end held by the player's lips is a hole with a sharp edge which is struck by the airstream emanating from his mouth. Ordinarily recorders have on their sides sixfinger holes which are closed and opened by the finger tips of the player to producethe distinct tones of the scale. But Leonardo's recorders look strange. The one on theleft has two broad slits on the side of the tube, and the other one long, thin slit. Whatcan be the purpose of these slits? Fortunately we have an explanatory text in Leonar-do's most beautiful calligraphv, running from right to left: "Questi due fiuti non fannole mutazione delle loro voci a salti, anzi nel modo proprio della voce umana; e fassi

col movere la mano su a giu, come alla tromba torta, e massime nel zufola a; e possifare r/8 e r/16 di voce, e tanto quanto a te piace [These tn'o flutes do not change theirtone bv leaps,l but in the manner of the human voice; and one does it by moving thehand up and down just as rvith the coiled trumpet and more so in the pipe a; and youcan obtain one eighth or sixteenth of the tone and just as much as you wantl."Obtaining an eighth and one sixteenth obviouslv means (in acoustical language) toreach the upper octaves; and "moving the hand up and down" evidently means notto stop prearranged finger holes but to move along the slits to change pitch graduallyor, as we say todar', to produce glissandos (gliding tones).

Such a glissando instrument would not have fitted into the orchestra ofLeonardo's day. Could he have foreseen in one dreamy corner of his incredible brainglissando instruments such as the one invented in r9z4 by the Russian scientist LevTheremin and called by the inventor's name and later also by the name

r. As most wind instruments do.

492

WIND I\STRU\{ENTS ag3

aetherophone? But, come to think of it, did Benjamin Franklin foresee all the impli-cations rr-hen he, a late-born Prometheus, stole lightning from heaven? DidLeonardo perhaps want to imitate birdcalls? Or did he just think of inventinganother of his tricky toys to baffle or amuse the cavaliers and ladies at the court ofLodovico Sforza, an occupation to rvhich he devoted much time, too much time,instead of pushing forward his manv projects in the natural sciences, his manyplanned books, mentioned so often in his notes but never completed; not to speak ofhis rt'ork as a painter, sculptor, and architect! We see that Leonardo was forced, onoccasion, to promote norr-useful knor,vledge.

lVhatever the purpose of this invention was, what was its origin? Where couldhe have found the idea or a model for his glissando pipes? The clue or key for thisproblem lies in the words uoce umana. although I must confess that I found thesolution by chance and then had it confirmed by Leonardo's own words. The modelfor our glissando pipes is found in the larynx, and it is significant that Leonardo callsthe larynx "voce humana," thus applying this term to the human voice as well as tothe machinery that produces it.

Illustrations at.z and rr.3 show some of the designs of the larynx and thetrachea that Leonardo made in the Quaderni d'Anatomiay t7 r (illus. rr.z) andQuaderni d'AnatomiaY 16 r (illus. rr.3). we recognize immediately that the upperopening resembles that of a recorder. Furthermore in the accompanying texts in theFogli d'anatomia (now in Windsor Castle) the trachea is called t'istola, which is alsothe name of a vertical flute, for instance, the recorder.

There is, however, one flarv, in our analogy: Leonardo wrongly attributed thechange of pitch of the human voice to the narrowing or widening of what he calledanuli della trachea (the cartilage rings of the trachea) and failed to observe the func-tion of the vocal cords in the larynx. This failure rvas probably caused by the techni-cal difficulty of dissecting the small and fragile larynx. By the way, Leonardo,sdrawings of it have been believed to have been based on the anatomy of an ox, a dog,or a pig. Leonardo was not everywhere permitted to perform dissections of thehuman body. He could do so in Florence at the Ospedale di Santa Maria Nuovabecause he had good friends there, as we mav infer from the fact that he sent hissavings there for safekeeping from war-threatened Milan. It was, so to speak, hisSwiss bank account.

At any rate, rve have here in Leonardo's glissando recorder a new musicalinstrument which acfually opened, or could have opened, a new musical horizon;which works well (some reconstructions that I have made function); and which waspatterned after an anatomical analogy, the larynx, whose actual function was mis-understood by Leonardo. Hence we have here a positive result built upon wrongpremises.

The transference of a correctly observed structure in the human body into aneminently practical mechanism is found in Arundel263 (BM) r75 r (illus. rr.4), whichwe have discussed before because of its many sketches of drums. In its lower sectionit contains several extremely interesting sketches for the mechanism of wind instru-ments. On the uPPer left, we find two straight tubes, the lower with the mouthcup

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WIND ISSTRU}{ENTS

11.4. Arundel 263 (BM) r75 r, sketches of new key mechanisms for wind instruments.

of a trumpet. Both instruments have a second, auxiliary tube. What is its purpose?Here we must recall that the wind instruments of Leonardo's time did not possessthe many keys which we find in our modern orchestral instruments. It was thefingertips of the players that closed and opened the six or seven finger holes whichwere spaced along the tube not at random but according to acoustical ratios. Now,when lower, and theref ore longer, instruments were needed, a problem arose. Thestern laws of acoustics demanded finger holes spaced at certain mathematicallydetermined intervals, but these holes rvould have been too far from one another tobe controlled by the short ten fingers of the player. Leonardo found a solution,actually several, although we will deal here rvith only one.

Leonardo draws the main tube, perforated by seven holes for the seven tones;seven little double lines, evidently levers for closing pads, reach over to the maintube from the auxiliary tube, which also possesses a compactkeyboard of seven keyscomfortably close to one another. But where is the connection between this centralkeyboard and the distant closing pads where motion is required? My suggestion isthat Leonardo thought of wires; he indicated them at the right of the open end of theauxiliary tube. Leonardo knew that the mechanism of the human hand and fingerscontained a solution for a problem of this kind. Lr Windsor AN. A r9oo9 r (Aror)(illus. r.5), he draws the tendons of the hand as they transfer motion from a centralpoint to the point where motion is needed, the fingertips. A similar situation existsin the fingers: see, for example, Windsor AN. A. Tgoogv (Arov) (illus. rr.6). Thereremains only to say that Leonardo's idea stayed buried in his notebooks: we do noteven know whether he himself ever built an actual instrument embodying his inven-tion. Still, the significance and novelty of his invention are indisputable. Four-hundred and fifty years later the wind instrument with a complete keyboard (illus.n.7) was invented in Munich by Theobald Bohm. Bohm (not without significance for

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WI\D:\iTRU\{ENTS

11.7. Transverse flute bv Theobald Bdhm with complete key system. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 23.273.

our theme) was a flutist, a connoisseur of theoretical acoustics, and a silversmith.In Madrid MS II folio 76 r (illus. rr.8), the sketch in the upper right corner

rePresents a wind instrument: two pipes point into the air, a third one points dow,n.They all emerge from a contraption that is, beyond doubt, a bellon's. The three pipesgive the instrument a superficial similarity to a bagpipe in that they resemble itschanter (the melody pipe) and its drones. And indeed, Leonardo begins his verbaldescription with the explanation that the new bellows used here are made "perpiva.": The word phta means, or at least can mean, "bagpipe."

The bellows is indeed ingenious-it consists of two sections arranged to theleft and right of an immovable dividing w'all. If the right section is pushed against thervall, the air enclosed is compressed and pushed toward the pipes; at the same time,the left section is automatically expanded, inhaling air. This kind of automaticallr'srnchronized, alternating breathing is an improvement-or at least a simplifica-don-of the conventional two alternating bellorvs, which were ordinarily used inLeonardo's time and long thereafter for organs and, of course, for many extra-musical purposes, such as the blacksmith's forge and metal-smelting furnaces,and which had to be pumped by two people or two motor impulses.

Leonardo's accompanying explanation reads as if this contraption had oc-curred to him as a new invention. In fact I do not know of earlier examples of thistype of bellon-s in texts or illustrations. Perhaps it worked best in small sizes, whilefor smelting and other industrial purposes the arrangement of two alternating large,separate bellon-s proved more practical.

At the end of his explanatory text Leonardo claims that his nen- bellows pro-duces "continuous lvind." This claim, of course, has to be taken tvith a certainreserve. There is, first, the inevitable dead point, when, one of the bellol's sectionshaving reached its maximum volume and the other its minimum expansion, the

z. The page is headed "De strumenti armonici." Then follows the text: "Per piva, sia fatto iltramezzo del mantice.a., fermo alla cintura. Ed il.b. sia fermo con il braccio, il quale braccio poi,muovendosi in dentro ed in fuori, aprird e serrerh il mantice, al bisogno, ciod quando il mantice.n.aprird, il mantice.m. serrerd. E quando.m. aprird, .n. serrerd. E cosi il vento sard continuo."

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IWI\D I\5TR,L-MENTS Ag9

pumFrinE acrion goes into reverse. This imparts to the pipes a moment of silence,which, ]-It'\'ir-ever short, is just as noticeable as the pauses between the upstroke andthe don-nstroke of a fiddle bon', or n'hen the player of a concertina turns from theexpanding phase to the compressing phase, or vice versa.3

Quite apart from this dead moment of silence we have to bear in mind the factthat the n'ind stops immediatelv n'hen the bellows action stops. This is not the caserr,ith the bagpipe. The sounding pipes of a bagpipe are supplied with wind by abag,made of the skin of an animal. This flexible wind reservoir is filled with air eitherfrom the player's mouth bv means of a blowpipe or, in later specimens, such as themusette of the eighteenth centun', from a pair of bellows.a A bag of this typesupplies wind for some time, even after the player has ceased to breathe into theblorvpipe or to pump the bellon's r\-ith his arm. In this way a real continuity of soundis achieved.s Such a bag is missing in Leonardo's contraption.

Furthermore, another essential feature of the bagpipe is missing: the chanter,or melody pipe, H'hich is a reed pipe equipped n'ith finger holes. These are stoppedbv the fingers of the pla'v-er to produce the melodr', rvhile the larger drone prp"tsupply the continuous humming bass. Normallr,, the chanter has a shape differentfrom that of the drones. In Leonardo's sketch, only the pipe on the left pointingdown is approximatelv in the position of a bagpipe chanter, but it has the sameshape as the other tr.t'o pipes and, more importantly, does not shou'the faintest traceof finger holes. Therefore, Leonardo's contraption is certainlv not a bagpipe, and ifhe calls it piaa, he uses this rr-ord not as an equivalent for conternusa ot zampygna,both common names for bagpipes, but in its original meaning, that is, pipa, ,,pipe,,

or "pipe instrument."What then is our instrument? Because there are only three tubes-not enough

for a scale or melody-and because there is not even machinerv for selecting oralternating single tones, we can onlv assume that three simultaneous tones of dif-ferent pitch formed a chord, in all probabilitv a triad. The tubes would then betrumpets rather than reed pipes, and the n'hole machine would be not an instru-ment designed to play actual music but possiblv a gadget created to sound a three-voice signal as a kind of fanfare. One recalls the manifold activities of Leonardo as anorganizer of fdtes, processions, and stage entertainments. Perhaps our musicalgadget served as a hidden machine that produced fanfares easily to accompany the

3. Hou' much Leonardo was aware of the mechanical limitations of bellon.s is clear from anobservation he made in quite a different realm: "If flies produced rvith their mouths the sound that canbe heard when ther' flr', they,would need a great pair of bellon-s for lungs in order to produce a wind sostrong and long, and then there would be a long silence in order to draw into themselr.es an equalvolume of air; therefore, rvhere there was a long duration there u'ould be a long intermission,, (Arundelz@ (BM) 257 r).

4' The blowpipe, unbecoming to a lady's cheeks, was replaced by a dainty little bellon-s attachedto her wrists. This rvas thecase in the elegant and lavishly decorated musette, ihe fashionable bagpipeof the perfumed pseudo-shepherdesses in the fAfus champAtres of Versailles and Fontainebleau.

5' For the evolulion and mechanism of bagpipes, including those of Leonardo's time, see E.Winternitz, "Bagpipes and Hurdy-gurdies in their Social Setting," The Metropolitan Mttsettnt of ArtBulletin zQgq):55-9.

2OO \{I\D INSTRUMENTS

appearance of allegorical figures, such as Fama or Gloria, n-ht-r, bv long iconologicaltradition, had trumpets or even multiple trumpets. |ust as Lrne example, I mightmention the beautiful quadruple trumpet in the hands of Fama rillus. rr.9) in one of

the early sixteenth-century tapestries at the Metropolitan Museum. representing the

Triumph of the Fame over Death, one of the numerous illuskations of Petrarch's

trionfi in Leonardo's time.6Leonardo must have been more impressed with his new bellorr-s than with the

whole triple trumpet machine, for in ihe next two drawings he applied it to a small

set of organ pipes and even to a large chamber organ.The sketch of the portable organ (illus. rt.8, second drawing from top right)

bears two inscriptions: on the lefl, tasti dell'organo ("keys of the organ"), and on the

upper right, canne stiacciate ("flat pipes"). As the text on the left reveals, they are

made of wood (righe) or cardboard (carta).7 Six pipes can be distinguished-astrange number, too many for a chord and too few for a scale, although the sketch

may, of course, be only a hasty suggestion.An indispensable element of an organ, the one by which the single kevs open

up and shut off the access of the wind to the single pipes, is not indicated at all. Here

again Leonardo may not have taken the trouble, as so often happened in his quick

embodiments of passing ideas, to include technical details that he took for granted.

The combination of organ pipes and bellorvs recalls immediatelv the construc-

tion of an organetto, an immenselv popular and practical instrument used in Leonar-

d.o's time and for cenfuries before. \\'e may, therefore, cast a quick glance at various

types of organettl, concentrating on the question of bellows. If n'e disregard the

larger instruments, which n'ere plaved on a table and which required the use of both

hands on the keyboard and therefore an extra person to operate the alternating

bellows at the back (illus. rr.ro), we find the following arrangements used in or-

ganetti: one small bellows beneath the wind chest, operated bv the plaver's left hand(itt.6. u.t); a single large bellows at the back of the wind chest, operated by the

player's left hand while his right hand pressed the keys with the fingers in a position

that would strike a later musician as very awkward (illus. tttz); and two small

alternating bellows at the back of the wind chest, operated bv the player's left hand

(illus. l:t3).In all these small instruments, where the single or altematingbellows had to be

worked by one hand, there was an inevitable pause in the rvind supply, and there-

fore in the music, behveen the movements of the bellort's. Nevertheless, as the

fingers on the keys could play only melodic lines without substantial chords, the

puus" caused by the bellows mechanism was not more noticeable than that of an

Lxperienced singer breathing in the middle of a phrase. Still the wind chest,

essential to every organetto, must have helped somewhat to bridge these pauses

although it did not have the flexibility of the bag in the bagpipe as a wind reservoir.

6. See fames J. Rorimer, "The Triumphs of Fame and Time," The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Bulletin 35 Q94o): 242-44.

7. "Organi di canne schiacciate fatti di righe o di carta."

F

17.9 Fama rr'ith quadruple kumpet, in atapestn-depicting the Tdumph ofFamr \ortx French

".r Flemish, six-

teenth centun'. \letropoiitanMuseum of Art.

Positive organ with altematingbellorss, from the Unicorn Tapes-

fnes, about 15oo. Cluny Museum,Paris.

1L.L0

11.11. Angel musician Playing an or-ganetto. Museo del1'Opera delDuomo, Fiorence.

rr.rz. Angel pla;'ing an organetto with a

large single bellows on the back ofthe instrument. Detail of the organpanels from Niiiera by HansMemling, ca. 1465. Art Museum,Antwerp.

\^/I]{D I N STRUMENTS

Angels, one of whom plays an or-ganetto with two alternating bel-lows. Relief by Agostino di Duc-cio, ca. t46o. Rimini Cathedral.

At any rate, our sketch does not include any visible wind chest. Thus the windsupply depended exclusively on the action of Leonardo's special bellows, which,however, as we have already pointed out, immediately stops providing air r,vhenpumpirlg ceases. One possibility that rvould justi{y the new bellows remains. Thesketch shows a little curve at the lower left comer of the bellows. If this indicates ahandle, it was perhaps worked with the elbon' (con gomito), thus leaving both handsfree for the keyboard, an achievement that rvould indeed have meant notable prog-ress if we assume that this instrument was supposed to have many more pipes thanthe six delineated.

Even more problematic is the small sketch of a chamber organ (illus. rr.8, thirddrawing from top right) flanked by two bellon,s evidently of the same constructionas those in the tn,o upper sketches. The big box from which the pipes arise contains,of course, the inevitable wind chest that, in every pipe organ, guarantees an evenwind pressure and a continuous sound just as the bag does in the bagpipe. There-fore, the application of Leonardo's special bellows to this organ makes little sense.Any simple conventional bellows would do just as well.

CHAPTER TWELVE

The Paragone:TheRole of ,n4wsic in

the Comparison of the ,lrts

Leonardo's most interesting ideas about the nature of Music and her noble status as

an art are included in his Paragone (comparison of the arts), a treatise animated by theintention to exalt the noblest of all arts, Painting, "the grandchild of Nature andrelative of God." Yet for the reader between the lines it is a fascinating spectacle tosee how Music, the inferior sister of Painting, and "ill of many defects," appears at

closer study and at second thought to be an art equally as noble as Painting and a

discipline in her own right, the figuratione dell' inaisible . T};.e Paragone, ot Comparisonof the Arts, is part of the Trattato della Pittura, a book arranged after Leonardo'sdeath from his writings on the arts scattered throughout many of his manuscripts,including some now lost, bv his pupil Francesco Melzi. Melzi's manuscript is now inthe Vatican library, known as Codex Vaticanus (Urbinas) o7o. We can only guess

why Leonardo did not himself arrange and edit these ideas in book form-mostprobably he did not have the time.1 Often in his manuscripts he reminds himself towrite "a book" on this or another matter, but none of these has come to us.

The first printed editions of the Trattato appeared in r65t, in French as well as

Italian. The Paragone forms the first part of the Trattato and is comprised of 45 smallsections, which we will call chapters, retaining the numbers given to them in the

edition by Heinrich Ludwig.2If we seek to clarifv the role and rank assigned to music by Leonardo, we find

that the existing translations do not suffice, because the translators were not familiarenough with all the evidence of Leonardo's theoretical and practical concern withthe art of music; also they were not sufficiently acquainted with the structure ofmusic as an aesthetic phenomenon and with the musical thought and terminology of

r. The most recent accounts of the Trattato are: Anna Maria Brizio, ll Trattato della Pittura diLeonardo, in Scritti di Storia dell'Arte in onore di Lionello Venturi, Rome 1956; A. Philip McMahon,Treatise on Painting by Leonardo da Vinci (Princeton University Press, 1956); Kate Trauman Steinitz,Leonardo da Vinci's Trattato della Pittura, a bibliography (Copenhagen , r9S8); Carlo Pedretti, Leonardo da

Vinci, On Painting, A Lost Book (Berkeley 1964).

z. HeinrichLudwig, LeonardodaVinci: DasBuchaonderMalerei; vol. 15of the QuellmschriftenfilrKunstgeschichfe (Vienna, r88z).

204

THE ; ii'-

Leonardo's dar'. Thus, I had to make mv orrTr translations of the chapters,thereof, relevant to music.

\\:henever my translation of certain passages did not seem to me to be the onlypossible one, or when no exact equivalent existed in English, I inserted an alterna-tive in square brackets.

TEXTS AND COMMENTS

Trattato z r

{. cHn DIFFERENTIA i, PATLA PITTURA ALLA POESIA. La PittuTa d una poesia muta, et Iapoesia d una pittura ciecha, e l'una e l'altra va imitando Ia natura, quanto d possibile alle loropotentie, e per l'una e per l'altra si po dimostrare molti morali costumi, come fece Apelle conla sua calunnia. ma della pittura, perchd serue al' occhio, senso piu nobile, che l'orecchio,obbietto della poesia, ne risulta una proportione armonicha, ciod, che si come di molte uarieuoci insieme aggionte ad un medesimo tempo, ne risulta una proportione armonicha, laquale contenta tanto il senso dello audito, che li auditori restano con stupente ammiratione,quasi semiuiui. ma molto pii fard le proportionali bellezze d'un angelico uiso, posto inpittura, della quale proportionaliti ne risulta un'armonico concento, il quale serue al' occhioin uno medesimo tempo, che si faccia dalla musica all' orecchio, e se tale armonia dellebellezze sarir mostrata allo amante di quella, da chi tale bellezze sono imitate, sanza dubbioesso resterA con istupenda ammiratione e gaudio incomparabile e superiore a tutti l'altrisensi. Ma della poesia, la qual s'abbia i stendere alla figuratione d'una perfetta bellezzaconlafiguratione particulare di ciaschuna parte, della quale si compone in pittura la predettaarmonia, non ne risulta altra gratia, che si facessi i far sentire nella musicha ciaschuna uoceper se sola in uarj tempi, delle quali non si comporrebbe alcun concento, come se uolessimomostrare un'uolto d parte ir parte, sempre ricoprendo quelle, che prima si mostrano, dellequali dimostrationi l'obliuione non lascia comporre alcuna proportionalitir d'armonia, perchdl'occhio non le abbraccia co'la sua uirtir uissiua a' un medesimo tempo. il simile accade nellebellezze di qualonque cosa finta dal poeta, le quali, per essere le sue parti detteseparatamente in separati tempi, la memoria no ne riceue alcuna armonia.

{r wHlr r}IE DTFFERENCE rs BETwEEN rATNTTNG AND poETRy. Painting is mute Poetry, andPoetry is blind Painting, and both aim at imitating nature as closely as their power permits,and both lend themselves to the demonstration [interpretation] of divers morals and cus-toms, as Apelles did with his "Calumny." But since Painting serves the eye-the noblestsense and nobler than the ear to which Poetry is addressed-there arises from it [fromPaintingl harmonv of proportions, just as many different voices [tones of different pitch]joined together in the same instant [simultaneously] create a harmony of proportions whichgives so much pleasure to the sense of hearing that the listeners remain struck with admira-tionasif half alive. Butstillmuchgreateristheeffectof thebeautifulproportionsof anangelicface represented in Painting, for from these proportions rises a harmonic concent [chord3]

3. Theterms chordand,forthatmatter,polyphony werenotyetidiomaticinthemusicaltreatisesof Leonardo's time, although polyphonic musical practice used chords. In fact, full triads had becomefashionable about one generation before Leonardo.

205

or Parts

rt

2C,6 THE PARAGONE

rvhich hits the eye in one and the same instant just as it does rtith the ear in Music; and if suchbeautiful harmony be sholvn to the lover of her whose beauties are portrayed, he will nodoubt remain struck by admiration and bv a joy without comparison. superior to all the othersenses. But if Poetry would attempt a representation of perfee-t beautv by representingseparately all particular parts [features] that in Painting are joined together bv the harmonvdescribed above, the same graceful impact rvould result as that rvhich one lvould hear inmusic, if each tone were to be heard at separate times [in different instruments] withoutcombining themselves into a concert [chord], or if [in Paintingl a face n-ould be shown bit bybit, always covering up the parts shown before, so that forgetfulness r+,ould prevent us fromcomposing [building upl any harmonv of proportions because the eye with its range of visioncould not take them in all together in the same instant-the same happens n'ith the beautifulfeatures of any thing invented by the Poet because they are all disclosed separately atseparate [successive] times [instants] so that memory does not receive from them any har-mony.

Comments on Trattato 2I

The precedence of the eye over the ear-or rather, of sight over hearing-is men-tioned throughout almost all chapters of the Paragone that deal with the comparisonbetween Painting and Poetry. But as soon as Leonardo sets out to demonstrate thispreeminence of the eye, he seems to fall immediately into contradictions, for thedistinction of Painting is based on a fundamental feature of music-harmoniousproportions; and Painting is accorded precedence over the arts of the ear because itshows harmony, just as does an art for the ear-music. Very clearly, Leonardodescribes the phenomenon of the chord (the simultaneous occurrence of severaltones) although the term chord is not yet in his vocabulary; he rather speaks of thearrnonico concento created simultaneously by proportions-evidently the proportionsamong tones of different pitch.a

Although Music is a temporal art like Poetry, it has proportions, of whichPoetry is deprived. This is demonstrated by comparing a poem n ith a piece of musicperformed, not by all voices simultaneously, but one voice after another (in aariseparati tempi), an absurd procedure that would prevent the formation of verticalharmony.

Memory is briefly mentioned in the last sentence, but its basic function in thetemporal arts of retaining the past sections of the work is not described.s Otherwise,Leonardo would have been forced to acknowledge, besides pitch, proportions ofsimultaneous musical tones, proportions between successive portions of works ofmusic or poetry.

4. Leonardo was, of course, well versed in the tradition of Pythagorean proportions and entirelyat home in the theory of harmony, especially the musical treatises of his friend, Franchino Gaffuri. Healso was familiar with Leon Battista Alberti's theory of proportions in De Re Aedificatorla, completed1452, published 1485. There, Alberti recommends borrowing the laws of visual shapes (t'igure) from themusicians since "the same numbers that please the ears also fill the eyes and the soul with pleasure."

5. About Leonardo's notion of memory as victor over time, see the "Epilogue" (pp. zrg-4).

THE P.r.,i.i.:J'.i 207

Trattato :_t

ofrorr-r..rr DTFFERENTIA ET ANCHoRA sI\{ILITL'DINE, cHE HA LA prrruRA co' ta poESrA. La

pittura ti rapresenta in un' subito la sua essentia nella uirti uisiua e per il proprio rr.ezzo

donde la impressiua riceue li obbietti naturali, et anchora nel medesimo tempo, nel quale si

compone l'armonicha proportionalita delle parti, che compongono il tutto, che contenta ilsenso; e la poesia rifferisce il medesimo, ma con mezzo meno degno che l'occhio, il qualeporta nella impressiua piir confusamente e con piir tarditA le figurationi delle cose nominate,che non fa l'occhio, uero mezzo intra l'obbietto e la impressiua, il quale immediate conferisce

con somma veritA le vere superfitie et figure di quel, che dinnanzi se gli appresenta. delle

quali ne nasce la proportionalita detta armonia, che con dolce concento contenta il senso, nonaltrimente, che si facciano le proportionalitd di diverse uoci al senso dello audito, il qualeanchora d men degno, che quello dell'occhio, perchd tanto, quanto ne nasce, tanto ne more,

et i: si veloce nel morire, come nel nascere. il che intervenire non pd nel senso del vedere,

perche, se tu rappresenterai all' occhio una bellezza humana composta di proportionahta dibelie membra, esse beliezze non sono si mortali nd si presto si struggono, come fa la musica,

anzi, ha lunga permanentia e ti si lascia vedere e considerare, e non rinasce, come fa Ia musicanel molto sonare, n6 t'induce fastidio, anzi, t'innamora ed d causa, che tutti li sensi insiemecon l'occhio la uorrebbon possedere, e pare, che a garra uogliono combatter con l'occhio.pare, che la bocca se la uorebbe per se in corpo; l'orecchio piglia piacere d'udire le sue

bellezze; il senso del tatto la uorrebbe penetrare per tutti gli suoi meati; il naso anchoravorebbe ricevere l'aria, ch'al continuo di lei spira. . . .

. . . un medesimo tempo, nel quale s'include la speculatione d'una bellezza dipinta,non pud dare una bellezza descritta, e fa peccato contro natura quel, che si de'e mettere perl'occhio, a uolerlo mettere per l'orecchio. Iasciaui entrare l'uffitio della musica, e non uimettere la scientia della pittura, uera imitatrice delle naturali figure di tutte le cose.

olo or rrrr DTFFERENCE AND AGAIN Tr{E sI}IILARITv BETwEEN rATNTTNG AND poETRy. Paint-ing presents its content all at once to the sense of sight [and it does so] through the same

means [organ] by which the perceptive sense receives natural objects, and it does so in [at,withinl the same span of time, in which there are established the harmonic proportions ofthose parts which together make up the whole that pleases the sense; and Poetry presentsthe same thing, but through a means [organ] less noble than the eve, and brings to ourperception r.t'ith more confusion and more delav the shapes [forms, delineations] of the

designated [verbalized] things [the things presented]. The eye [on the other hand], that truelink between the object and the sense of perception, presents [supplies] directly and withgreatest precision the actual surfaces and shapes of the things appearing before it. Fromthese [surfaces and shapes] arise those proportions called harmony which in their sweet

combination [unitr', concord] please the sense, in the same manner in which the proportionsof diverse voices please the sense of hearing which again [as I said before] is less noble thanthe eye, because there [in the sense of hearingl as soon as it is born, it dies, and dies as fast as

it was born. This cannot happen with the sense of sight; for if you [as a painter] represent tothe eye a human beauty [the beauty of the human body] composed by the proportions of itsbeautiful limbs, all this beauty is not as mortal and swiftly destructible as music; on thecontrary, it [beautyl has permanence [long duration] and permits you to see and study it [atleisurel. It is not reborn [does not need to reappear, come back] like music is when playedover and over again up to the point of boring [annoying] you; on the contrary, it enthralls you

208 THE PARAGONE

[makes you love it] and is the reason that all the senses, together rvith the eye, want topossessit, sothatitseemsasif thevrlantedtocompetewiththeeve. Iln fact] itseemsasif themouth wants to swallow it bodilv, as if the ear took pleasure to hear about its attractions [thebeauties of itl, as if the sense of touch rvanted to penetrate it through al1 its pores, and as ifeven the nose wanted to inhale the air exhaled continually by it [bv t'eaut_v]. . . . The sameinstant within which the comprehension of something beautiful rendered in Painting isconfined cannot offer [give] something beautiful rendered by [verbal] description, and he

who wants to consign to the ear what belongs [must be consigned] to the eve, commits a sinagainst nature. Here, let Music with its specific function enter, and do not place here [intothis rolel the science of Painting, the true imitator of the natural shapes oi all things. . . .

Commmts on Trattato 23

Although here only painting and poehy are compared, music comes into the argu-ment. The argument focuses on the simultaneity of all elements of a painting ("in unsubito," "nel medesimo tempo"). The main argument contrasts the eye, as the morenoble instrument of perception, with the ear. The eye as the real ("vero") mediatorbetween the world of objects and human receptivity presents shapes at once andsimultaneously. Only in this way harmonv based on proportions can materialize.The ear, or rather the sense of hearing upon rvhich poetry depends, furnishes theshapes of things less clearly and with delavs. "Delay" ("tardita") evidently means"not in medesimo tempo." "L'armonica proportionaliti delle parti" is evidentlysynonymous with expressions used frequently later such as "proportionalitd dettaarmonia." The discussion of this armonia gives occasion to throw a side glance uponmusic, which, paradoxicallv enough, is considered to lack this harmony that is madepossible only by a simultaneously composed object such as the limbs of a beautifulharmonious body and their proportions. Music suffers from the defect of repeti-tiousness or rather its need to be performed over and over again ("molto sonare"),which creates nausea, boredom ("fastidio").6 This implies, of course, another flawof music, its main defect, namely, its quick passing or fading away; inTP zg,3o, and

3rb Leonardo again refers to this flaw.After this brief side glance at music, Leonardo returns to poetry and painting,

and arrives at a sharper formulation of their basic difference by introducing theconcept of, as we would call it today, art in space versus art in time. In poetry, timeseparates one word from the next; oblivion interferes and prevents any harmony ofproportions.

This is a rather naive and unfair criticism of poetw. Oblivion does not preventthe listener and even less the reader of Poetry from retaining past parts of the r.r,ork ofart; there is memory, for the function of which Leonardo finds beautiful formula-tions, for instance, in CA 75 aandCA 9 a, and a poem can be envisaged in retrospectas a harmony of its successive parts. More important for our purpose, Leonardohimself seems, later in the Paragone, to suggest proportions between successive

parts. But he does so only for Music, not for Poetry (see TP 3o and 3z and also

6. Leonardo does not explain whether Poetry is not affected by this same disadvantage.

T H E F.l ,i.r- : -- \: 2o,9

perhaps 29). Here, however, Leonardo does not elaborate any further on successive

parts and their proportions. Yet he makes an important statement that seems to take

Music out of its position as sister of that other temporal art, poetry, and seems to

suggest that if the flow in time prevents harmonious proportionalitd in Poetry, this is

not necessarily so in Music, if onlv Music is considered by its own rights and merits.

Poetn', as we must read betrveen the lines, cannot legitimately do for the ear what

Painting can do for the eve, and he insists it is a sin against nature to blur this

borderline. But where does this leave music? "Here let music with its specific func-

tion take its own place [assume its specific role] and do not confuse it with the science

of painting, "that true imitator of true shapes of all things."Two words desen'e comment here: l'uffitio dellamusica and imitatrlce. The first

emphasizes music's characteristic role and realm; it does not aim at imitation but ishors cle concoyrs, i^a class of its own and not inferior to either painting or poetry. This

term of the argument anticipates the more explicit definition of music in TP 3z as

figuratione delle cose inuisibili.In his writings on anatomy Leonardo gives a long and

careful outline of a planned book on anatomy. Immediately after this outline he says:

"Then describe perspective through the office of the sight or the hearing. You

should make mention of music and describe the other senses."

lmitatrice and imitare in general must not be understood as literal, or rather

passive copying but as the act of re-creation of shapes and figures; only this interpre-tation of the function of painting supports its claim to being the noblest and most

scientific of the arts.

Trattato z7

{o nrsrosra DEL RE MATTTA AD u}i poETA, cHE GAREGGTAUA coN uN PITToRE. Non sai tu,

che la nostra anima b composta d'armonia, et armonia non s'ingenera, se non in istanti, ne

quali le proportionalitd delli obietti si fan uedere, o' udire? Non uedi, che nella tua scientia

non d proportionalitd creata in istante, anzi, l'una parte nasce dall' altra successiuamente, e

non nasce la succedente, se l'antecedente non more? Per questo giudico Ia tua inuentione

esser assai inferiore d quella del pittore, solo perchE da quella non comPonesi proportionalitd

armonica. Essa non contenta la mente del'auditore, o'ueditore, come fa la proportionalitd

delle bellissime membra, componitrici delle diuine belTezze di questo uiso, che m'E dinanzi,

le quali, in un medesimo tempo tutte insieme gionte, mi danno tanto piacere con la loro

diuina proportione, che null'altra cosa giudico essere sopra la terra fatta dal homo, che dar la

possa maggiore.Con debita lamentatione si dole la pittura per esser lei scacciata del numero delle arti

liberali, conciosiachd essa sia uera figliuola della natura et operata da pin degno senso. Onde

attorto, o scrittori, l'hauete lasciata fori del numero delle dett' arti liberali; conciosiachd

questa, non ch'alle opere dit natura, ma ad infinite attende, che la natura mai le cred.

{e nrnrv oF KrNG MATHTAS To A poET wHo coMpETED wITH A rAINTER. Do you not know

thai our soul is composed [made up] of harmony, and that harmony is generated only in

those instants in which the proportionality of things can be seen or heard? Do you not see

that in your art [PoetryJ proportionality is not created in an instant, but that on the contrary,

or," prit is born from the other, succeeding it, and that this succeeding one is not born if the

270 THE PARAGONE

Preceding one does not die? Therefore I regard your invent.-: .::: much inferior to thepainter's for the sole reason that in vour art no harmonious trr:\,-=.-nalitv is formed. Yourinvention [art] does not satistv the mind of the listener or beht-rldc: -:,r< :he proportionality ofthe beautiful parts that together iorm the divine beauties of this :a;= i^.e:e before me, whichjoined together in the same instant give me so much pleasure rr-ith ::.e:: livine proportion,that I believe there is no man-made thing on earth that can give grea:e: :ieasure. . . . It is ajustified lamentation if Painting complains of being expelled from the ::u::.ber of the LiberalArts, [justified] because she [PaintingJ is a true daughter of nature and --'es the noblest ofall senses. Therefore, it was wrong, oh rr-riters, to have left her out from tie number of thementioned Liberal Arts; because she devotes herself not only to the creatir-rns of nature but tocountless others that have never been created bv nature.

Comments on Trattato z7

TP 27, which introduces King Mathias Corvinus, does not contain a direct referenceto Music; still it is important in our context because of its reference to armonit,proportionalitd, and diaina proportione in relation to the minds of the Iistener and theonlooker. Harmony is denied to Poetr.v because in Poetry one part is born from itspredecessor "successively." Here, if a reference to Music would have been made atall, it would have become clear that \{usic knorvs at least one form of harmony,namely, harmony in simultaneih'("nel medesimo momento"), i.e., as a combina-tion of tones of different pitch into chords; and this alone would have established thesuperiority of Music over Poetn'. As it is, this is suggested only later in TP 29. By theway, Leonardo does not recognize explicitly harmony or proportionality betweensuccessive portions of a poem or any work of Poetry, for instance, the formal balancebetween the strophes or the lines of a sonnet, although he seems to recognize thiskind of proportionality in Music (see TP z9).

The last two phrases of TP 27 are of interest because here Leonardo proffersopenly his complaint that Painting is unjustly omitted from the ranks of the liberalarts, which is especially unfair if one considers that Painting is not only dedicated tothe works of nafure but can create infinite works never created by nature.

Trattato z9

1!o corrrr LA MUSICA sI DE' cHIAMARE SoRELLA ET MrNoRr DELLA prrruRA. La Musica non dda essere chiamata altro, che sorella della pittura, conciosiach' essa E subietto dell' audito,secondo senso al occhio, e compone armonia con le congiontioni delle sue parti proportionalioperate nel medesimo tempo, costrette d nascere e morire in uno o piu tempi armonici, liquali tempi circondano Ia proportionalitA de' membri, di che tale armonia si compone nonaltrimenti, che si faccia la linea circonferentiale le membra, di che si generalabellezza umana.ma la pittura eccelle e signoreggia la musica, perch' essa non more imediate dopo, Ia suacreatione, come fa la sventurata musica, anzi resta in essere e ti si dimostra in vita quel, che infatto d una sola superfitie. . . .

{oHow MUSrc sHouLD BE cALLED THE youNGER srsrER oF pArNTrNG. Music cannot be

better defined than as the sister of Painting, for she depends on hearing, a sense inferior to

tt

T H E .D.r. .i .r. : _- _.; E

that oi the eve, and establishes harmonv bv uniting her proportional parts [elements] that are

performed simultaneously [i.e., the voices or melodic strands that run at the same time, thatis, in jur.taposition within the polvphonic rvebl, elements that are destined [forced] to be

born and to die in one or more harmonic sections which confine [include] the proportionalityof the elements [members], a harmonv composed [produced, established] the same wav as is

that outiine of the members [of the human bodyl which creates human beauty. But Paintingsurpasses and outranks Music since it does not die instantly after its creation as happens tounfortunate Music; on the confran', it stavs on [remains in existence] and so shows itself toyou as something alive n'hile in fact it is confined to a surface. . . .7

Comnrents on Trattato z9

Trattato z9 begins u'ith a meditation on Music itself and is fraught with seemingcontradictions. Clear is the statement that Painting excels and lords over Musicbecause Music dp.g immediatelv after birth lacks perrnanence. Leonardo hasstressed this aspect before (TP z3). Yet Music, in spite of its flow, is credited withharmony of proportions, which poses the question of whether Leonardo meansproportions between successive portions of the work of Music. It is here that the textseems obscure or at least inconsistent. For first harmony is described as a conjunc-tion of proportionate parts performed simultaneously ("nel medesimo tempo"); butright afterward the text introduces the plural: "in uno o piir tempi armonici," artdthis seems ambiguous. It could mean that chords occur one after another and thateach is equipped with harmonv in the sense defined. But it could also refer tosuccessive portions of Music and in favor of this interpretation is the formulationthat the "tempi armonici circondano la proportionalitd de membri," which could betranslated as instants in the florg that include between them sections of Musicproportionate to one another. If this interpretation is correct, then Leonardo, in aremarkably independent approach to the phenomenon of Music, would haveapplied the concept of proportion to the relation between successive portions ofMusic and thus established the notion of a quasi-spatial structure of portions bal-anced against one another.

There are two facts that would invite such an interpretation of TP z9 first, itfalls in with Leonardo's definition of Music as the figuratione del inaisible (figurationevidently meaning shape or form [see TP 3z]); second, the text of TP z9 goes on tocompare the proportional sections ("membri") of Music with spatial portions ormembers that bv their proportions produce the beauty of the human body. Thelimbs of the bodv could, of course, hardly be compared with musical chords but onlywith sections of the musical flow.

It is thus the painter Leonardo, who, starting from his most beloved art,Painting, finds similarities with Music, an approach basically different from that ofthe musical theories of his time. As far as I can see, no treatise on Music of Leonar-do's day developed this notion of musical form as a balance between the parts of acomposition, although contemporary treatises abound, of course, with the notion of

241

7. The remainder of TP z9 is of no interest for Music.

272 THE PARAGONE

numerical ratios between tones of different pitch. Leonard.. :r.ust have been familiarn'ith this traditional element in musical theory, at least thr.-u:h the treatises of hisfriend Caffurius.

Trattato jo

f ranra rL Musrco cor. prrroRE. Dice il musico, che la sua scientia e ja essere equiparata

a quella del pittore, perchd essa compone un corpo di molte membra, del cuale lo speculatore

contempla tutta la sua gratia in tanti tempi armonici, quanti sono li tempr. nelii quali essa

nasce e muore, e con quelli tempi trastulla con gratia l'anima, che risiede nel corpo del suo

contemplante. ma il pittore risponde e dice, che il corpo composto delle humane membra

non da si se piacere a' tempi armonici, nelli quali essa bellezza abbia a variarsi, dandofiguratione ad un altro, ne che in essi tempi abbia a nascere e morire, ma Io fa permanente per

moltissimi anni, et E di tanta eccellentia, che la riserva in vita quella armonia delle propor-tionate membra, Ie quali natura con tutte sue forze conservare non potrebbe. quante pitturehanno conservato il simulacro d'una divinabellezza, ch'el tempo o'morte in breve ha

distrutto il suo naturale esempio, et d restata piu degna l'opera del pittore, che della natura

sua maestra!

r.?o rrm MUsrcrAN spEAKS wrrH TrrE pATNTER. The Musician claims that his science is [of a

rankl equal to that of the Painter because it Imusicl produces a body of manv members whose

whole beauty is contemplated bv the listener Iobsen'er, contemplator] in as manv sections of

musical times as are contained betrveen birth and death [of these sections]; and it is these

[successive] sections with u'hich Music entertains the soul residing in the body of the con-

templator.But the Painter replies and savs that the human body, composed of many members,

does not give pleasure at [successive] time sections in which beautv is transforming itself by

giving shape (form) to something else, nor that it [beautyJ needs, in these time sections, to be

born and to die, but rather that he [the Painter] renders it [the bodr'] permanent for very

many years and the painting is of such excellence that it keeps alive that harmony of well-

proportioned members which nature with all its force would not be able to preserve-howmany Paintings have presen'ed the image of divine beauty whose real model has soon been

destroyed by time or death, so that the Painter's work has sun'ived more nobly than that of

nature, his mistress.

Comments on Trattato jo

TP 3o actually does not expound any new arguments in favor of the Musician, butrepeats his claim that his science equals that of painting because it operates bycombining one "corpo" out of many members. Whether these members are succes-

sive sections of the musical flow is not entirely clear but seems to be suggested by the

term tanti-tempi armonici confronting the contemplation of the listener-if speculatore

could be at all translated by "listener."When the Painter, however, tries to defend his claim of superiority, he adds to

P.75.

8. Mistranslated with "rhythms" by J. p. Richter and Irma Richter, Paragone (London, 1949),

THE' PARAGONE 2a3

his old arguments one new angle: he credits painting with the capacity of"figuratione," implying that this capacity is lacking in music. we must emphasizethis here because later in TP 3zthat "figuratione" is regarded also as a characteristicof music, although, unlike the "figuratione" used by painting, it is the figuration ofthe invisible.

The end of chapter 3o, emphasizing the power of painting to preserve theimage of a person beyond his death, echoes ovid, Metamorphoses, book xv, with thefamous lamentation of the aging Helen of Troy observing in the mirror the wrinklesof her face and weeping about Time, the great destroyer of things, and Leonardo'so\^,n paraphrase in CA 7r ra:

O tempo, consumatore delle cose, e, o invidiosa antichitd, tu distruggi tutte le cose econsumi tutte le cose da duri denti della vecchiezza a poco a poco con lenta morte!

Elena quando si specchiava, vedendo le vizze g-rinze del suo viso, fatte per la vec-chiezza, piagnie e pensa seco, perchd fu rapita due volte.

O tempo, consumatore delle cose, e o invidiosa antichitA, per la quale tutte le sonoconsumate.

O Time, thou that consumest all things! O envious age, thou destroyest all things anddevourest all things with the hard teeth of the years,little by little, in slow death! Helen,when she looked in her mirror and saw the withered wrinkles which old age had made in herface, wept, and wondered to herself why ever she had twice been carried away.

O Time, thou that consumest all things! O envious age, whereby all things are con-sumed.

Trattato j r

{o rr rrrronr oA r cnapr DELLE cosE opposrE atr' occrtto, coME't uusrco pA onttr vocroPPosrE Att' oruccnro. Benchd le cose opposte all' occhio si tocchino l'un e l'altra di mano inmano, nondimeno fard la mia regola di XX. in. XX. braccia, come ha fatto el musico infra levoci, che benchd la sia unita et appiccha insieme, nondimeno a pochi gradi di voce in voce,domandando quella prima, seconda, terza, quarta e quinta, et cosi di grado in grado ha postonomi alla variet) d'alzare et bassare la voce.

Se tu o musico dirai, che la pittura d meccanica per essere operata con l'esercitio dellemani, e la musica d operata con la bocca, ch'd organo humano, ma non pel conto del senso delgusto, come Ia mano senso del tatto. meno degne sono anchora le parolle ch'e' fatti; ma tuscittore delle scientie, non copij tu con mano, scrivendo cid, che sta nella mente, come fa ilpittore? e se tu dicessi Ia musica essere composta di proporzione, o io con questa medesimaseguito la pittura, come mi vedrai.

{O TTTT PAINTER USES DECREES FOR THE oBJECTS APPEARING To THE EYE, JUST AS THE MUSI-CIAN DoES FoR rHE voICES RECETvED By rHE ran. Although the objects confronting the eyetouch one another, hand in hand [one behind the other], I will nevertheless base my rule on[distances of] XX to XX braccia, just as the Musician has done, dealing with [the intervalsbetweenl the tones [voices]: they are united and connected with one another, I'et can bedifferentiated by a few degrees tone by tone, establishing a prime, second, third, fourth, andfifth, so that names could be given by him to the varieties [of pitch] of the voice rvhen it movesup or down.

24 THE PARAGONE

If vou, oh Musician, will sav that Painting is mechanical because it is performed byusing the hands, [you should consider that] music is performed $-ith the mouth, which isalso a human organ though not [in this case] serving the sense of taste. just as the hands [ofthe Painterl do not serve the sense of touch-[and as for word-arts] rvords are even moreinferior than actions [such as those just described]-and you, oh Writer on the sciences,

doest thou not copy by hand, like the Painter, that which is in the mind? And if vou say thatMusic is composed of proportion, then I have used the same [method] in Painting, as you willsee.

Comments on Trattato 3I

TP 3r touches on another comparison between music and painting which is far-

fetched but reveals how eager Leonardo is to do justice to music within the Paragone.

He compares the objects as they confront the eye in a continuous receding row or

chain ("opposte all' occhio si tocchino l'un altra di mano in mano") with the grada-

tion of tones, that is, with the musical tones that by their numerical ratios ("gtadi divoce in voce") form a scale. The mathematical rationalization of pitch values of tones

is, of course, old Pythagorean and Boethian tradition and was commonPlace inLeonardo's time; it is this mathematical qualiW of music that gave it a place among

the liberal arts, but to credit painting n'ith a similar rational basis was a relatively

novel idea. Leonardo's argument is expresslv, although only in passing, stated in TP

3rb: "Since you accorded to music a place among the liberal arts, either place there

painting also, or remove music from there."It is, of course, the science of perspective which Leonardo has in mind when he

speaks of "la mia regola di XX in XX Braccia" (receding of objects from the eye by a

standard distance of zzo yards). It is easy to see how forced the whole comparisonis-a much more substantial comparison between linear perspective and acoustical

phenomena is found in MS L 7gv, where Leonardo tries to find the ratios of fadingsound or, more precisely, the proportions between the volume of sound and the

distance between the ear and the source of sound; there he establishes a "regola,"which in his own language could be termed a perspective of sound.

TP 3ra deals with the art of sculpture.

Trattato j rb

Quella cosa E piir degna, che satisfa a miglior senso. Adonque la pittura, satisfatrice al

senso del vedere, d piu nobile che la musica, che solo satisfa all' udito'

Quella cosa E pii nobile, che ha piir eternitd. Adonque la musica, che si va consumandomentre ch'ella nasce, d men degna che la pittura, che con uetri si fa eterna.

Quella cosa, che contiene in se pii universalitir e varietir di cose, quella fia detta di piiteccellentia. adonque la pittura d da essere preposta a tutte le operationi, perchd d contenitricedi tutte le forme, che sono, e di quelle, che non sono in natura; € pin da essere magnificata et

esaltata, che la musica, che solo attende alla voce.Con questa si fa i simulacri alli dij, dintorno a questa si fa il culto divino, il quale d ornato

con la musica a questa seruente; con questa si dd copia alli amanti della causa de'Ioro amori,

con questa si riserua le bellezze,le quali il tempo e la natura fa fugitive, con questa noi

riserviamo le similitudini degli huomini famosi, e se tu dicessi la musica s'eterna con 1o

scriverla, el medesimo facciamo noi qui cO le lettere. Adonque, poi chd tu hai messo la musica

THE PARAGONE 2a5

infra le arti liberali, o tu vi metti questa, o tu ne levi quella, e se tu dicessi li huomini vidi lad'operano, e cosi d guasta la musica da chi non la sa.

That thing is worthier which satisfies the higher sense. Thus, Painting, since it satisfiesthe sense of seeing is nobler than Music, which satisfies only the ear.

That thing is nobler which has longer duration. Thus Music, which withers [fades]while it is born, is less worthy than Painting, which with the help of varnish renders itselfeternal.

That thing which contains within itself the greatest universality and variety of objectsmay be called the most excellent. Thus Painting is to be preferred to all other activitiesbecause it is concerned [occupies itself] with all the forms which do exist and also with thosewhich do not exist in nature; it is to be more praised and exalted than Music, which isconcerned only with sound [voice].

With Painting one makes the images of gods, around which divine rites are held whichMusic helps to adorn; with the help of Painting, one gives lovers likenesses [portraits] ofthose who aroused their ardor; through Painting one preserves the beauty whicn time andnature cause to fade away; through Painting we preserve the likenesses of famous men, andif you should say that Music becomes eternal when it is written down, we are doing the samehere with letters. Thus, because you have given a place to Music among the LiberaiArts, youmust place Painting there too, or eject Music; and if you point at vile men who practicePainting, Music also can be spoiled by those who do not understand it.

Comments on Trattato j rb

TP 3tb, combining earlier and new arguments, expounds various reasons for thePreeminence of Painting over music. (r) Painting satisfies the highest sense, sight,music only the sense of hearing-but why sight should be nobler than hearing is notelaborated. (z) Painting is permanent, music evanescent. (3) Painting occupies itselfwith objects of more universality and varietv than music, which is based only onsound (an argument so questionable that one is not surprised to find it nowhere elsein Leonardo's writings).

The passage on the place of painting and of music among the liberal arts hasbeen commented on in my explanation of TP 3r.

Other arguments proffered here, such as the comparison between musicalscores and letters, are rhetorical rather than serious.

Trattato j r c

Se tu dirai le scientie non mecaniche sono le mentali, io ti dird che la pittura d mentale, ech'ella, sicome la musica e geometria considera le proportioni delle quantitd continue, el'aritmetica delle discontinue, questa considera tutte le quantitd continue e le qualitA delleproportioni d'ombre e lumi e distantie nella sua prospettiva.

If you [the Musician] say that only the nonmechanical lphysical, bodilv, material]sciences [liberal arts] are concerned with the minde and that, just as Music and Geometrv

9. Mistranslated by Irma Richter, Paragone, p. 77: "lf yousay that the sciences are not 'mechani-cal' but purely of the mind," which implies that atl sciences are not mechanical, rr.hile Leonardoevidently wants to distinguish between scientie meccaniche and scientie mentali.

276 THE PARAGONE

deal n-ith the proportions of the continuous quantities, and Arithmetic ilith the proportionsoi the discontinuous quantities, [so] Painting deals with all the continuous quantities andalso with the qualities of the proportions [degrees] oflo shades and lights and distances intheir [its?] perspective.

Comments on Trattato 3Ic

TP 3tc introduces a new basis of comparison, the question of whether Painting andMusic are concerned with proportions of "continuous quantities," as is geometry, orwith "discontinuous quantities," as is arithmetic. The answer given is that both arts

concern themselves with continuous quantities. This statement mustbe understoodin the light of the former explanation that Painting is based on perspective ("le cose si

toccano l'un l'altra di mano in mano") (TP 3r) and of the awareness that Music exists

as continuous flow. Heretofore its flow, by a poetic rather than scientific argumenta-tion, was proffered as evidence of its transience and mortality, flaws not inherent inthe nobler art of Painting. Now the flow-that is, the smooth gliding from one tone

to the next-elevates Music to a "scientia mentale" dealing with continuous quan-tities, like Geometry and Painting. Thus, under scientific scrutiny, a sort of equality

of rank is established between Painting and Music.Leonardo's distinction between continuous and discontinuous quantities

comes, of course, from Aristotelian tradition (see especially Metaphysics, 6. r, z). Its

application to the arts of Painting and Music is Leonardo's own. According to Aris-totle (Logic 5a), line, space, and time belong to the class of continuous quantities,"for itis possible to find a common boundary at which their parts join'" Leonardo'sjudgment of Poetry (or "speech" in Aristotelian terminology) as inferior to Music and

Painting is probably also based on Aristotle: "speech is a discontinuous quantity, forits parts have no common boundary" (Aristotle, Logic 4b3z).

As for the distinction between scientie meccaniche and mentali, one should lookatTP 33, not reprinted here, because it does not deal with Music. There, the problemis approached through the consideration of "esperientia," that is, empirical re-

search. The classification of arts into artes mechanicae and artes liberales is medieval.

Trattato jz

{ocorvcrusroNE DEL poErA, prrroRE E Musrco. Tal diferentia i: inquanto alla figuratione

delle cose corporee dal pittore e poeta, quanto dalli corpi smembrati a li uniti, perchd il poeta

nel descriverelabellezza o'brutezza di qualonche corpo te Io dimostra a membro a membro

et in diversi tempi, et il pittore tel fa vedere tutto in un tempo. el poeta non pud porre con le

parole la vera figura delle membra di che si compone un tutto, com el pittore, il quale tel pone

innanti con quella veritA, ch'd possible in natura; et al poeta accade il medesimo, come al

musico, che canta sol' un canto composto di quatko cantori, e canta prima il canto, poi iltenore, e cosi seguita il contr' alto e poi il basso; e di costui non risulta la gratia della

ro. I. Richter mistranslates as follows: "... with the qualities of proportions, shadows and

light.. . ."

247

prLr;ur:onalitd armonica, la quale si rinchiude in tempi armonici, e fa esso poeta a

simiiirudine d'un bel volto, il quale h si mostra a membro a membro, che cosi facendo, nonremar:esti mai satisfatto dalla sua bellezza, la quale solo consiste nella divina proportionalitddeIe rredette membra insieme comprrste, le quali solo in un tempo compongono essa divinaarrnL'rnia d'esso congionto di membre, che spesso tolgono la libertd posseduta a chi le vede. e

la musica ancora fa nel sur-r tempo armonico le soavi melodie composte delle sue varie voci,delie quali il poeta d privato delia loro discretione armonica, e ben che la poesia entri pel sensodell'audito alla sedia del giuditio, sicome la musica, esso poeta non pud descrivere l'armoniadella musica, perchd non ha potesta in un medesimo tempo di dire diverse cose, come IaprLrportionalitd armonica della pittura composta di diverse membra in un medesimo tempo,Ia dolcezza delle quali sono giudicate in un medesimo tempo, cosi in comune, come inparticolare; in comune, inquanto allo intento del composto, in particolare, inquanto allointento de' componenti, di che si compone esso tutto; e per questo il poeta resta, inquantoalla figuratione delle cose corporee, molto indietro al pittore, e delle cose invisibili rimaneindietro al musico. ma s'esso poeta togiie in prestito l'aiuto dell' altre scientie, potrir compa-rire alle fere come li altri mercanti portatori di diverse cose fatte da piu inventori, e fa questo ilpoeta, quando s'impresta l'altrui scientia, come del oratore, e del lilosofo, astrologho, cos-mografo e simili, le quali scienze sonno in tutto separate dal poeta.

{o coNcrusroN oF [rrm orscussroN BETwEru] rrrE poET, THE rATNTER, AND rHE MUsr-craN. As for the representation of bodily [corporeal] things, there is the same differencebetween the Painter and the Poet as between dismembered and united things, because whenthe Poet describes the beauh' or ugliness of a body, he shows it to vou part by part and atdifferent [successive] times, rlhile the Painter lets you see it in one and the same moment[simultaneously]. The Poet cannot L-reate [establish] with words the real shape of the partswhich make up a whole, as does the Painter, u'ho can put them before you with the sametruth that is possible in nature [in the concrete appearance of nature], and the same thinghappens to the Poet [the Poet encounters the same difficulty] as rvould to the Musician, if thelatter u,ould sing by himself some music cLrmposed for four singers, by singing first thesoprano part, then the tenor part, and then follon-ing it by the contralto and finally the bass;from such a performance does not result [ensue] the grace lbeaulvJ of harmony by propor-tions [musical harmony as produced by the consonance of several voices of different pitch as

established bv the acoustical proportionsl, rshich is confined to moments of harmony (en-dowed rvith harmony, i.e., chords)-this is preciselv what the Poet does to the likeness of abeautiful face u'hen he describes it feature by feature. You would never be satisfied by such a

representation of beauty [of the beauty of the face], because that can onlv be the result of thedivine proportionality of these features taken all together since it is onh' at the very samemoment [simultaneously] that they create this divine harmony of the union of all featureswhich so enslaves the beholder that he loses his libertv.

Music, on the other hand, within its harmonious flow [time], produces the sweetmelodies generated bv its various voices, while the Poet is deprived of their specific harmonicaction, and although Poetry reaches the seat of judgment through the sense of hearing, itcannot describe [render, create] musical harmony because he is not able to sav differentthings at the same time as is achieved in Painting by the harmonious proportionalitv createdby the various [componentJ parts at the same time, so that their sweetness can be perceivedat the same time, as a vvhole and in its parts, as a whole with regard to the composition, inparticular with regard to the Isingle] component parts.

2a8 THE PARAGONE

For these reasons the Poet remains, in the representation of bodrlv things, far behindthe Painter and, in the representation of invisible things, far behind the \lusician. But if thePoet borrows from the other arts he can compete at fairs with merchanls rsho carry goodsmade by various inventors [makers]-in this way he acts when he b.rrrorr-s from othersciences such as those of the orator, philosopher, astronomer, cosmographer, and otherswhich are totally separate from his own art.

Commmts on Trattato 32

First, a difference is stated between Painting and Poetry as far as they occuPythemselves with the representation of bodily things ("figuratione delle cose

corporee")r--disjointed features are found to be the subject of Poetry, and unitedfeatures the subject of Painting. In fact this distinction is only another version of thedistinction between arts which present their objects in succession, in the flow, andthose arts which present their objects in simultaneity (see TP 3o). It must, however,be pointed out that Leonardo does not mean to restrict altogether the field of Poetryto figurazione delle cose corporee, because later in this chapter 3z,he has it compete also

with music in the field of the figuratione delle cose inaisibili.A very important point is touched upon n'hen Leonardo exalts Painting for

being able to put before us features with the truth of nature ("con quella veritd, che'dpossible in natura") because here a basic aesthetic phenomenon is accounted for-the concreteness of visual appearancHr to say it more precisely, the simultaneousimpact of an infinite number of features integrated in their concrete, immediateappearance. This observation of Leonardo's goes beyond the famous paragone ofthe eighteenth century, Lessing's "Laokoon," which strangely enough, does notanalyze this phenomenon of the visual arts. Goethe, we recall, was deeply aware ofit, for instance, when he admired Delacroix's illustrations for Faust, which, as he

remarked (Gespriiche mit Eckermann, Nov. 29, 18z6) added, or rather, were forcedto add by their very medium, details to the scene which were beyond his, the Poet's,

medium.Very striking and almost humorous is Leonardo's argument to prove the in-

feriority of Poetry to Painting by the absurd picture of the performance of a

polyphonic four-voice composition by one single singer, who could sing the fourparts of the polyphonic web one after another, thus losing harmony and thereby the

whole musical purpose altogether. At the same time, this caricature of Music revealsthat Leonardo credits Music, if correctly performed, with proportionalitd armonica,

one of the important advantages inherent, according to him, also in Painting.The remainder of TP )zreturns to the argument about proportions which was

taken up before in TP 27, z), 27, 29, and 3o. We will briefly examine later in theepilogue whether proportions can really mean the same thing in Painting and inMusic.

In a peremptory summary Leonardo states that in the figuratione delle cose

corporee the Poet ranks behind the Painter, and in the figuratione delle cose in-visibili, behind the Musician. What then, we ask, is the comparative rank betweenLeonardo's most beloved and exalted art, Painting, and Music? He has accorded

THE:.r..;.{c:olJE 249

ProF\lrtionality and harmonv to both of them; he seems also to ignore here the clich6disparagement of music-its evanexenc e-la malattia mortale (see TP zg: "la pitturaeccelle e signoreggia la musica, perche essa non more immediate dopo la suacrealione"). Nothing then hinders him from regarding Music as equally noble in itson'n right, in consideration of the peculiarities of this discipline. But this ultimateverdict had alreadv been pronounced in chapter z3 [of Paragone), which warnsagainst the confusion of arts for the eye and arts for the ear, concluding/'Lasciaaientrare l' uffitio della musica ( the peculiar business of music) : Let music enter by its ownmerits and do not confuse it rt-ith painting, the true imitative science.',11

EPILOGUE

These chapters of Leonard o's Paragone seem to amount to a mixture of naive, oftencontradictory statements, commonplaces of his time, rhetorical attempts to bolsterthe social status of the Painter, and profound original ideas about the nature of thearts, including that of Music.

To be fair, rve have to recall that the Trattato was not a book compiled byhimself but composed bv Francesco Melzi out of relevant passages-but by nomeans all the relevant passages-in Leonardo's notebooks and manuscripts.

Furthermore, Leonardo himself was never a consistent organizer of histhoughts, although he frequentlv reminds himself in his notebooks to write atreatise on this or that-treatises never found and most probably never written in thecontinuous onslaught of tasks and problems upon him, the artist, scientist, en-gineer, and provider of entertainment for the court.

Leonardo states clearlv in TP 34 (not included in our selection) that it is onlythrough ignorance that Painting was classed below the "sciences," by which hemeans the liberal arts. This ignorance is the lack of familiaritv with the most recentachievement of Painting, linear perspective: an exact rationalization of sight basedon mathematical proportions. This made Painting a quasi-mathematical science ofthe same nobility as Music, for centuries one of the members of the quadriviumtogether n'ith geometry, arithmetic, and astronomy. Leonardo was not the only oneto fight for the inclusion of Painting among the liberal arts. Half a century earlierLeon Battista Alberti had taken the same stand. And when Pollaiuolo in 493 de-signed the tomb of Sixtus fV, he added the allegorical figure of Prospettiaa to thefigures of the quadrivium and trivium (illus. rz.r).

For a summary it seems practical to list the criteria and arguments proffered byLeonardo in his Paragone for judging the comparative nobility of Music among thearts. Many notions were in the air, so to speak; some echo arguments indispensablein the fashionable, intellectual pastime of Leonardo's day, the disputation of the arts

u. Andr6 Chastel, The Genius of Leonardo da Vinci (New York: Orion Press, r96t) , p. JJ, seems tounderrate this assessment of music when he says: "Ultimately these [the spatial] arts take a higherposition than the temporal arts," perhaps because he does not reprint the critical chapters z3 and 3z ofthe Trattato.

I

220 THE PARAGONE

12.1. Detail fromPollaiuolo's tomb for Sixtus I\-. r-169. Sigrjricantlr', Pollaiuolo added to ihe traditional set'en

artes liberalis three more, among them, for the trst rrme, Prospettiva. Prospettiva, for its mathematicalbackground, was used by Leonardo to claim for painters, heretofore regarded only as artisans, the

status of scholars.

and their medts among courtiers and humanists; some are contradicted by deeper

thoughts in the Codice Atlantico and other notebooks of Leonardo, rvhere they are

mostly just hinted at and jotted down in Leonardo's typical "self-reminder" fashion.

A few, finally, contain new and ingenious ideas.

Clichi Arguments (the numbers indicate the chapters in which they occur):

a. The eve (Painting) more noble than the ear (Poetrv and Music): t6, zo, 27., 24, 27, 28, 29,

37b.b. The evanescence of Music; her mortal disease: fading: 23, 29, 3o, 1r:b. Strangely enough,

the same blame is not laid on Poetry.c. Boredom and disgust caused by repetitiousness:23.12d. Poverty of the musical realm; Music concerned only with sound, while Painting is univer-

sal, concerning itself n-ith all things that enter the mind: 3rb.

rz. On evanescence and disgusting repetitiousness, see also CA 332 vil "La musica ha due

malattie, delle quali l'una e mortale, l'altra e decrepitudinale: la mortale e sempre congiunta alloinstante sequente a quel della sua creazione; la decrepitudinale la fa odiosa e vile nella sua rep-licazione." (Music has two ills: one is mortal, the other is related to its decrepitude [feebleness]; the

mortal one is always linked to the moment that follows its incipience [each tone of it]; its feebleness

causing repetitiousness makes it hateful and vile.)

r

i

THE ?.{r-..r.-:ONE 22L

e. \fe-hanical arts: Music performed rr'ith the mouth: 31; see also, r9, 3tc; and, deviatingirtrm the clich6s, 33, not included in our selection.

Senous Citeria

1. Spratial Arts as Temporal Arts.|rts for the Eye as Arts for tlte Ear

The distinction is retained in various versions throughout nearly all the chapters of theTrattato included in the present essay: a6, zo, 27-, 24, 27, 28, 29, 3l.b. Curiouslyenough, the exaltation of Painting as the foremost visual art is often based onharmony, which is an integral feature of a temporal art: Music. In these contextsLeonardo stresses harmonv as a phenomenon restricted to one single instant,namely, the combination of several tones of different pitch in one chord (or as heterms it, "concento"); he never fails to emphasize in medesimo tempo. It is perhaps apity that the compiler of the Trattato did not include also some of the most salientstatements of Leonardo on the nafure of time as a continuous quantity, for instance,Arundel (BM) 263,17)v,7gov, and r3zr.

2. TheRole of Proportions and theContinuous Quantities:23, 27, 29, 30, 3r, 32A discussion of the various meanings of "proportions" in Leonardo's writingswould go far beyond the limits of this little chapter. In the Paragone trvo kinds of"harmonious proportions" are ascribed to Painting: first, the proportions of thesingle features of a face or anv other object of representation that create the harmonyof the whole; second, the numerical proportions that are implied in mathematicalperspective, that as a ner{ method used bv the Painter made Painting a mathematicalart worthy of admission into the quadrivium. The first kind of proportions is lseen]paralleled in musical harmont', that is, in the numerical relations between the pitchof the tones united in one chord. This u'ould restrict proportions to the "vertical"aspect of the flow of music. Hort'er-er, Music admits also the concept of"lengthwise" or "horizontal" proportions-that is, the relation between successivesections of a piece of music. There is no direct acknowledgment of such proportionsin the Paragone (see my comment to TP 3o), but Leonardo's arvareness of the prob-lem appears clearly from statements in British Museum Arundel 263, t716. There hediscusses, in the Aristotelian vein, the concept of continuous quantities in geometry(alreadv touched upon in TP 3rc), compares point and line with their counterparts intime, and, on this basis, affirms the proportionality of time sections. The passage istoo interesting for its bearing on musical time not to quote it here:

Benchd il tenpo-sia annumerato infra le continue qudtitA, per essere inuisibile e sanzaco{po, non cade integralm€te sotto la geometrica potentia, la quale lo diuide per figure e corpid'infinita varieta, come continuo nelle cose uisibili e corporee far si uede; Ma sol co' sua primiprincipi si cOuiene-, ciod col punto e colla linia-; il punto nel tempo d da essere equiparatoal suo instante, e la linia A similitudine colla lughezza d'una quantitA d'un tempo, e siccome ipnti so principio e fine della predetta linia-, cosi li instanti sO termine e principio di qualnchedato spatio di tempo; E se la linia d diuisibile in ifinito, lo spatio d'u t€npo di tal diuisione nond alieno, e se le parti diuise della linia sono proportionabili infra s6, ancora le parti de tenposaraflo proportionabili infra loro.

THE PARAGONE

Although time is included among the continuous quantities, it dtr€s-since it is in-risible and incorporeal-fall into the realm of geometry, whose dirisions consist of figuresand bodies of infinite variety, as a continuum of visible and corporeal thinss. But only in theirprinciples do they [geometry and time] agree, that is, with regard to the pr-rint and the line;the point is comparable to an instant in time; and just as a line is similar to the length of asection of time, so the instants are ends and beginnings of each given section of time. And ifthe line is infinitely divisible, so is the section of time resulting from such dirision; and if thesections of a line are proportionable to one another, so are the [successive] sections of timeproportionable to one another. 13

Similar statements based on Aristotle's book 6 of Physics, esP. 231b, 7; 2)2a;z31a; and 211b, :r5, are found in Leonardo, Arundel z6a (BM) 176r and rgov; but thereference to proportions between successive sections of time is Leonardo's ow'n, andso is the application of Aristotle's concept of continuous quantities to the field ofaesthetics, particularly to music.

If Leonardo thus admits proportions between successive sections of time andtherefore also of successive sections of a work of music, it remains strange that he

does not explicitly recognize the role of memory in creating forms in the flux. Mem-

ory is hardly ever investigated or analvzed bv Leonardo as a psvchological orphilosophical problem, except in connection u'ith Painting, the art that stems theflight of time by eternalizing the presence of a l"isual image. One of his rare generalreferences to memory is found outside the Paragone, in CA 76 a:

A torto si lam€ta li omini della fuga del tenpo, incolpando quello di troppa velocitd, nO

s'accorgi€do quello essere di bastevole trdsito, ma (la) bona memoria-, di che la natura ci ir

dotati, ci fa che ogni coas lungamete passata ci pare essere presente.

Wrongly do men lament the flight of time; they accuse it of being too swift and do notrecognize that it is sufficient [sufficiently moderate] in its passage; good memory, with whichnature has endowed us, makes everything long past seem present to us.

FIGURATIONE DELLE COSE CORPOREE VS FIGURATIONE DELLE COSE ITWISIBILI.

This distinction may seem at first glance similar to that between arts for the eye

and arts for the ear; yet it goes deeper. In chapter rz Leonardo speaks of the divinityof the science of Painting and, paraphrasing Dante,la calls the Painter the lordand creator (padrone, signore, creatore) of all the things which occur in humanthought. This concept seems to go far beyond the qualification of Painting as an artcopying nature.ls Should not then the idea have occurred to him that Music is stillmore free and god-like, since itcreates "out of nothing"? This seems to be implied inhis concept of the figuratione dell invisibile.

Music in the last analysis is not anymore the "younger and inferior sister of

13. See n. 4, above.:.4. " Arte, nipote di Dio."15. When Leonardo speaks of Painting as an art or a science "imitating" nature, he means, in line

with current theory, by "imitare," recreating nafure, and not "itrarre," i.e., redrawing, as for instance

in a camera obscura. See on this point also the forcible statements at the end of chap. 27, that Painting

can concern itself with creations that have never been created by nature.

THE -: r_-i.r.GONE 223

Painting" (W zg) butin even'sense "equiparata" (equivalent)to Painting (TP 3o). IfLeonardo had never said anvthing else about Music bevond defining her as afiguratione dell invisibile, this definition alone would suffice to convince us of hisprofound understanding of the nature of Music as a discipline that is not bound tocopv nature but with an unparalleled degree of freedom creates forms ("figure") outof a material neither tangible nor visible.

]

l

l

Conclusion

O tepo, consumatore delle cose, e o invidiosa antichitA, tu distruggi tutte le cose, e consumitutte le cose da duri deti della vecchiezza a poco cO l€ta morte! . . . (CA 7 ra)

O Time, consumer of all things! O envious agel Thou dost destrov all things and devour allthings with the hard teeth of years, little br'little in a slorv death.. ..1

A book attempting to add one facet to the oeuvre of a multifaceted genius shouldperhaps conclude with a sort of meditation on how a mind like Leonardo's, sodiversified, so flexible, so torn and driven by unbounded curiosity into manifolddirections of thinking and doing, u'as demonically obsessed by the strong convictionthat creation is a cosmos, an organic structure, and that all the innumerablephenomena observed are guided by basic, simple, interdependent laws; that crea-tion is a universe in the deeper meaning of the word, and that all seeming contradic-tions could be reconciled, if only he, Leonardo, had had the time to search longerand deeper. His incessant struggle to see order in disorder, cosmos in chaos, was hiscredo. References in his writings to the sacred books and to creation are not suffi-ciently frequent nor resolute enough to connect his thoughts w'ith religion in a

dogmatic sense.

The contradictions in the infinite realm of phenomena seem paralleled by andrelated to apparent contradictions within the structure of Leonardo's personality.One could easily choose a number of such violently opposed tendencies, whichalmost seem to tear asunder the unity of a complex character. To single out twopairs, each consisting of two antithetical, divergent tendencies: one, the contradic-tion between extreme slorvness in artistic creation versus extreme, even explosiverapidity; the other, the infatuation with rational, ornamental patterns versus thefantastic in its wildest extremes.

In the first antithetical pair the slowness of creation can be exemplified bynearly all of Leonardo's large works. One is also reminded of the words of Pope LeoX about Leonardo. In Vasari's report, Leo X, who knew Leonardo from their days in

r. Jean Paul Richter, The Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci (London: Oxford University Press,

939), vol. z, no. n63. See Ovid, Metamorphoses 15: "Tempus edax rerum, tuque, invidiosa vetustas."

224

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226 C9NCLUSTON

Florence, refused to give him a commission in Rome because, as the pope said, ,,This

man will never finish because he aln'avs thinks of the end of the rvork beforebeginning it."

The extreme rapidity is manifested throughout the notebooks in the sketches,studies, and versions swiftly replacing each other through alternatives until the penor stylus finds the solution.

In the second antithetical pair, the clean, cool, unemotional preference forrational, geometric, decorative patterns is expressed in his many designs for intri-cate knots which we find, for example, delicately woven into the twigs of the trees inthe ceiling fresco of the Sala delle Asse in the Castello Sforzesco, and also expressedin his infafuation for lunulae, those little moons or, rather, curved sections of circlesdrawn in enormous quantities to indulge in the traditional Ludus Geometicus. Inarchitecture there is a proclivity for polygonal church designs.

In strong contrast to these dispassionate entertainments for the eye and themathematical mind is Leonardo's passion for the fantastic, the unrestrained, wild oreerie, and spectral. We mention here as examples only the large drawings inWindsor Castle of volcanic eruptions, explosions, floods, apocalyptic visions, andother cataclysms destroying the civilized earth.

These are, of course, only trvo imperfect examples of contradictory charactertraits. But we are here at the end of the book, not at the beginning; and of a bookconcentrating on one interest of Leonardo-music. Therefore, we have to restrictourselves to the relation within Leonardo's mind between the temporal realm andthe spatial one, or, if you please, the musical and the visual.

The reader may rightly ask whether relations exist between Leonardo thepainter and Leonardo the musician. There are relations, and at the end of my book, itmay be appropriate to illustrate this by at least one example, a famous sheet (that is,two pages) with drawings, windsor ez76 r and rzz76 v. Both these pages dealprofoundly, I believe, with the flow of time, showing Time "questo consumatoredelle cose," as the great variation master who modifies incessantly the shape ofliving beings.

On one of our two pages, the largest drawing shows the profile of a prettyyoung boy who carries the conviction of an actual physical presence (illus. 13.r).

Next to it, at the right, a little smaller, we find the same profile-but not quitethe same: it is harder, the arch of the nose a little more pronounced, the chin moreprojecting, the sweet mouth more resolute, with a fuller lower lip. A similar profile isin the lower left corner of the pa1e, and immediately above it is an old man's profilewith the same features transformed by old age-with flabby throat, the lower lipstrongly protruding, the bridge of the nose sharply set in, yet with still some rem-nants of the silky locks.

Three other sketches on the lower part of the page translate the boy's profileinto the feminine. The profile in the upper left corner leaves the question of sexundecided.

It has almost become a clich6 to see, in the simultaneous appearance of an oldand a young head such as these in the Windsor drawings, the deliberate antithesis of

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1-L CONCLUSION

the lrric and heroic types, the ct-rntrast between the classical u'arrior and the epiceneprett)'bor': "the two hieroglrphs of Leonardo's unconscious mind, the two imageshis hand created when his attention r{'as wandering. . . r.irile and effeminate. . .

symbolizing the two sides of Leonardo's nature.,,2Without denying that such contrasts exist in Leonardo's art, I do not believe

that this explains all that there is to see in drawings like the present ones. If this werethe only explanation, why then the transition faces? why the use of the samesubstance for modification? Why, in other words, the use of the same theme forvariations?

Our problem becomes even clearer if we turn the page and look at the reverseside: the famous study of The Mndonna and Child with St. lohn (illus. r3.z). Let us heredisregard the sketch of the Madonna and the two sketches of the infant St. John, andinstead concentrate on some of the many doodles that fill the page. The profile of theboy dominates-no fewer than twelve versions of it. In the lower right corner werecognize again the sweet profile contrasted to two others which are a little morerobust and older. In the upper left corner, again the metamorphosis of sex is repre-sented. And in the lower left comer, again the sex is undecided. The most touchingand, from our point of view, certainly the most telling three profiles are in the center:(r) the boy with the flowing locks, similar to the center drawing of the other page; (z)then the same face after seventv or eightr' \'ears of life have left their mark; (3) and,finally, turning the wheel of time in the opposite direction, the profile of the child,jotted down in only one or tr.t,o lines of admirably sure physiognomical calligraphy.

What we witness here is nothing less than a meditation, a graphic meditation,in the form of doodles, on time. Leonardo creates a number of different versions ofthe same human profile, something that a musician may compare to a set or cycle ofvariations. But actually they do not constitute a strict musical form, with elementsfollowing in predetermined sequence. Creating the single sketches, Leonardo, byvirtue of his subtle connoisseurship of anatomy and physiognomv and of the impactof aging on one and the same subject, records what Time has done or could do to it atdifferent phases of life, and thus evokes Father Time, not as the great destroyer, butas generating visual variations complementing the capacih' of music as the" figur azione dell invisibile. "

z. Kenneth Clark, Leonardo daVinci (Cambridge: Penguin, ry58), p.7r.

APPE \DIX

Italian Texts

A 6r r: The Eddies at the Bottom of Water Mwe in nn Opposite Direction to Those Aboae

Io dico: se tu gitterai 'n un medesimo tempo z picciole pietre, alquanto distanti l'unadall' altra, sopra un pelago d'acqua sanzamoto, tu vederai causare, intorno alle duedette percussioni, z separate quantitd di circuli, le quali quantitir acresciendo, ven-gano a scontrarsi insieme, e poi a'ncorporarsi, intersegandosi l'un circulo coll'altro,semPre mantenendosi per cientro i lochi percossi dalle pietre. E la ragion si d chebenchd li apparisca qualche dimostrazion di movimento, l'acqua non si parte dal suosito, perchd l'apertura fattale dalle pietre subito si richiuse, e quel moto fatto dalsubito aprire e serrare dell' acqua fa in lei un cierto riscotimento, che si po piu tostodimandare tremore, che movimento. E quel ch'io dico ti si facci piu manifesto: ponimente a quelle fesfuche, che per lor leggerezza stanno sopra l'acqua, che per l'ondafatta sotto loro dall'avenimento de' circuli, non si partano pero dal loro primo sito.Essendo adunque questo tal risentimento d'acqua piuttosto tremore che movi-mento, non possan per riscontrarsi, rompere l'un l'altro, perchd avendo l'acquatutte le sue parti d'una medesima qualitir, 6 necessario che le parti appichino essotremor l'una all' altra, sanza mutarsi di lor loco: perchd stando l'acqua nel suo sito,facilmente po pigliare esso tremore dalle parti vicine, e porgerle all' altre vicine,sempre diminuendo sua potentia insino al fine.

Tria j6 r (Taaola 64 a): The Duration of a Blow

che chosa e sono. fatto dal cholpo

ll cholpo . ella

Il tenpo. nel quale . sigie sigienera. il colpo ella piu breve chosa che per lomo. sipossa fare. e non e si gran corpo che essendo sospeso. cho chon breve cholpo nonfacci subito movimento il quale movimento. riperchote nellaria ellaria. sona. chet-tocha la cosa mossa

Sel remore e nel martello o nellanchudine dicho. perche lanchudine non e.sosPesa. non po resonare resona il martello . lll nelbalzo cheffa dopo il cholpo esse

229

APPE}iDIX

CA z7o tc: Qualities of the Sun

qua lita de I soleI lsole a corpo. figura. moto. spr€dore. chalore. e virtu gie nerativa.

chose (l) parte tutte dasse I saza . sua d mj (njatio) nvitione

234

le quali

dlco. laujrtv visiuale ast€dersi . p li razi visuali i sino alla sqpfitie . de chorpindtrdspardtj I ella virtu. dessi. chorpi. asstendersi. insino. alla. vfutu. visiuale. eognj . simjle chorpo I epiere. tutta . la antjposta aria. della sua simjlitudne Ognj .

chor poB se. e ttuttj isie me fano | il simjle. e no sola m€te lepiano. della . (loro) .

simjlitudne della forma . Ma etiido della (uirtu spituali) simjlitudlne I de I la . potetja(tu ae)

T u ve d. il sole. quido tso,gril"rtfr'iu . ."t mezo. del nostro. emjsperio. eessere le spetie I de lla sua . forma . p tute le parte doue si dmostra . ved essere lespetie del suo splcdore I in tuttl quellj . medesimj lochi . e a ncora vi sagivgnje la si mjli tutlne della pot€za I del cha lore . e ttutte que ste potetie dsciedano dalla sua cavsa .

B linje radose nate nel suo I corpo e fi nj ti ne ii o bietti oppachi sdza d mjnvitjone 6l selatra mdtana . sta . chOtinvaqr€ta chola . si mj litudne . de lla sua potdtia . a

ste sa (ic) e incorporata I no che ne chorpi . ra gl Ma ne desi . traspar€tj e oppachi . eno d mj nuissepo d sua figura

cofutareadrlque. questj. mate maticj. che dcha no lochio (c) no navere virtu spiritua le

che I sast€da. fori d luj . iopro . che se chosi. fussi. n6 sarebe sdza grd sua . dmjnvitione ne lu sare I la ujrtu visiva. e che se lochio fussi grade qudto . (questo mo do)g lcor po dela terra . cho ue re be ne risguardare I alle stele . che ssi chdsvrhassi . epque sta (maghera) ragione . a segnjano lochio ricievere I e nd mddare ni€te d se

----------

A8r ro7,ro8A 19 r r:.8, rr9, rz7A 19 v rl9, rt9A zz v 72o, r3,4Az3r 724A4)r 124A5zv Lo4A6or 1o1A 6r r 7o7,229A6zv 44,45Arundel zg (BM) 46

r t7z-73, 188-89Arundel 261 (BM) r75 r a72,

174-82, t85, t93, t95Arundel 263 (BIv{) zz4 r 79, 8tArundel 263 (BIVI) z3r v 79, 80Arundel 263 (Blvl) z,;7 r a9g

B4v 777B6r 7a5B39r 4zB 5o v r54, r6il-62, t66B74t 745B 9o v 116, rr7

C 5 r, rt7, tr8C6v ro8C15r a24C15v 4zC 16 r rr8, tr9C z4 r 16, rr7, z1oCAgv 7o4CA 9 ra 127, a22CA 34 rb q7, t58CA 37 ra 79, 82

lndex of Codex References

C.{ ;r ra 271, 224CA ;6 a r21C-\ ; vb rr.., rt,6, z3oC.{ 9o va 1:C^{ lc'b va 1!r-l

CA r:6 ra 99 lorrCA 16r ra 1:CA r99 vb ir+CA zr3 r'a 155-i;CA zr8 rc 747, 7+2CA z$ r 74, -ttCA 267 ra ro6CA z7o vc roq, :lz8, zitCA 279 va 6i, 66CA 3o6 va 777, 772CA 3r9 rb t68, r7o, t7zCA 332 va 13J, 22oCA 345 vb ao4CA 147 ra 1o4CA 355 rc :.68, 169, r7zCA 36o ra 72)CA 197 rb 792, ag4

E 4v 7t)E 8 v 10-13

F4rv 98F56v ro6F6rr 1o9Forster II 3z v az4Forster II 69 r 122Forsterlll5r 111Forster III 88 r 4z

G96r 1oJ

H z8 r 751, 152, 1;;5H z8 v 1-5o, 157-a2H45r 155H 45 r 152-55H 46 r a52-1;,qH67r 1)6H ro4 r' 157

I 65 Q7) r t35185 g7) r ozI tz9 (8t) t' rz7

Kzr 722K ro9 r' 1o,l

L5lv 1olL63r L72L78r goL 79 v rz5, tz6, ztqL 8o r rz5, rz6

Madrid MS I folio 9r v 7g7Madrid MS I folio i6o r fi9,

769Madrid MS II folio 7_; r' 118,

r86lvladrid MS II folio 76 r 9o,

t59-6o, tg7, rg8MS zo17 Bib. Nat. r r 72o, 727MS zo37 Bib. Nat. C r 1o, 1r,

r83, r85MS zo37 Bib. Nat. D r 1S7MS zo38 Bib. Nat. zz r' 1j+

Quaderni d'Anatomia II ror 79,82

233

234

Quademi d'Anatomia III rzv 111

Quademi d'Anatomia IV ror xvii, rrz

Quaderni d'Anatomia V 4r75

Quaderni d'Anatomia V 6v a)o/ 737

Quaderni d'Anatomia V r5t 73o, 132

Quaderni d'Anatomia V 16r 193, 194

Quaderni d'Anatomia V 17t 79), 794

Quaderni d'Anatomia V zov L)7,132

TP zr zo5-o6TP z1 4o, zo7-ogTP z7 4o, zog-toTP z9 zro-rzTP 1o zrz-t1

INDEX OF CODEX REFERENCES

iP ,i r 21J-14TP _rrb 2l.4-75TP _irc zr5-r6TP 1z zr6-t9TP ro8 7o3TP rz5 ao3TP rz6 70)TP r35 1o3Trir'. 7 v (Tavola rz a) 72oTrir'. r8 v (Tavola .g a) 1o5Triv. 36 r (Tavola 64 a) 1o8-o9,

229-30Triv. 4o v (Tar,'ola 7r a) a36Triv. 43 r (Tavola 73 a) ro8-o9,

122, 734

Windsor rzz76 r zz6-27Windsor rzz76 v zz5-26Windsor c.285 44Windsor ez86 44, 45Windsor L2294 42Windsor rz3r9 42

Windso: ::r,<o '149

[\'indsr.r:-,-t rz6\r{indsor ::i-,i E+, 85Windsor r:;-r S;, 86Windsor r:-<-_; 57, 88Windsor rz-;1 87, 88Windsor rz5; 87, 88Windsor rz58r 8;, 8gWindsor 12585 85, 86Windsor rz69z. t' 91-9jWindsor AN. A r9oo9 r (A ro

r) ry5-96Windsor AN. A r9oo9 v (A ro

v) 795-96Windsor AN. A rgorz v (A r3

v) t36Windsor AN. B r9o3z v (B 15

v) 7a2Windsor AN. B r9o48 r (B 3r

r) rrrWindsor AN. B r9o58 r' (B 4r

v) 56, r88

F

$eneral lndex

acoustics, 97-r36modem, 97in Vitruvius's De Architectura,

1O3, L04Adorno, Doge, 5afterimages, 1-22, 723, 7)), tj|Agostino di Duccio, zozAgncola, 47Akrisios, King of Argos, VAlberti, L. B.

De Re Aedifiutoria; 206, 279Albonesi, T. A.

lntroductio in chaldaicamlinguam, syriacam atquearmenicam et decem aliaslinguas, ry

Aldine Press, r8nAlfonso II, z7alla certosina, z7allegorical female figure, 87, 89Amboise, 84Ambrogio de Predis (disciple of

Leonardo), 8, 3o, 67,68,7o

analogies, 97n

-verbalafterimage of bel[ sun/odor,a14

broken water rvave'humanvoice from keg, rr3

circular spread of echo/oceanwave, 115

deceptive sensations in ear/eye, 717

diminution of lighl heat'odor,99

echo/leaping ball, rr7emanation of ravs in sighV

heat/sound./odor. rz8formation of dust figures

mountaintops, rroharmony of proportions in

eyelear, 205-17, 277-27light/smell, qJ, 734

lingering of vibration in anobjecUafterimage in eye,109

lingering sensation of belUfi rebrand/raindrops/waterwaves/knife blow/voice,723

movement of water waves(eddies)/wind/sound inair, ror

pitch of sound of pipes/bells/guns, 112

proportions in musicalharmonv painting, :.r7

range of mind (soul, spirit)rt'ater sound fire, r36

reflection of lightsound, rr9spread of lighUhammer blon'/

sound./magnetic at-tractiorVsmell, 98, 99

spread of sound of spokenword,{ight in mirroredroom, 114

-visualbrain/onion, r3rsee also comparisons; per-

spectiveanatomy

animal, jg, 58, fubird beak, 4odrawings of, 5relbow, zo3fistola, r93goat skull, 4ohand and fingers, 46, r95horse skull, xiv,39-72human brain, r3rhuman heart, 79, 8zhuman skull, 56-63inner ear, rz9-32larynx, t3z, rg3sensus communis, r3rskulls and bones as subject of

meditation, 39

trachea, r71, 712, 1J2, 1-gjvocal cords, r33see also Leonardo

Andromeda, 48, 5rangel, 76

Annunciation, 7concerts, 28, 3zwings, r3

angle of reflection of light andsound, rr9

anvil, see blowApollo, z8-29,15, )6,76, narchetto infinito, see bowArezzo, 4trArgentieri, D.

Leorurdo da Vinci, rc4nAristotle, zt6, zztartists'guild, 3aulos, r88

bagpipe, 84,86,87, 117, 797,200

double, 48symbolism, r36

Balfour, H.The Friction Drum, to5

Balkans, 38Bartolommeo di Giovanni, 53,

54Baschet, A.

Aldo Manuzio, r8nBeham, 8.,86, 87bell, 92, 91, rz3

hit by ball, ro8hit by small and big beaters,

7L2pitch of large and small, rrrsympathetic vibrahon, rzotunable, 186volume of sound of one large

v. many small, rz-1

Bellincioni, 8., ZS, Z6Bellini, G., zg, 3o, 16nbellows, 1.97, 2cn-o)

235

46

Berense.n, 8., 8Dr;;'i,:qs of Florentine Painters.

E6

Bergamo, ;Bertolotti, A.

Artisti in relazione coi GonzagaSignori di MantoLta, a9n

Bible, 58Old Testament, z8

Biggiogero, M.De Diaina Proportione de Luca

Pacioli, rcBilli, A., xxiibird

as mechanism, r3flight, 98n

blowon hard resonant object, ro8see a/so duration of blow;

sound; time; vibrationBode, W., 58nBodmer, H.

Leonardo, 84, 87Boetian, zr4Bohm, T., r95Boltraffio, 58nbombarde, rc1Book of Hours, 47

of B. Sforza, 28, :.44of Jeanne d'Evreux, 4Z; see also

Pucelle, J.Borgia, C., tzoBorgo San Sepolcro, robow, r5o

archetto, r54, 16zarchetto infinito, r57for fiddle, rrrfor lira da braccio, 3o, r4rfor viola organista, 16z

Breughel the Elder, P., r83Bizio, A. M., xvii

Il Trattato della Pittura diLeonardo, zo4

Rassegna, xxvScritti Scelti, xvl1i

Brugnoli, M. Y., 4znBrunelleschi, 48, 7y, 77bucranta, 47,6oBurckhardt, J., vii, xxv

Cicerone, xxivKultur der Renaissance, 71n

cactarella, t83Calsi, G.

Un' allegoria di Leonardo, 86Camerata, 75rzCampagnola, G. and D., 7rcannon, see noise; soundCanova, 4oncanzona, 84Caravaggio, xxivCarlo dell'Acqua

Lorenzo Cusnasco e i Lingiardida Paaia, 19

Carpaccio, 25, )o/ j7, 57, 58Carse, A.

Musical Wind lnstruments, rtz

C:rtrvright, J..;btlla d'Este, Marchioness of

Mantua, 19Casio, 58nCastello Sforzesco, see MilanCastiglione

Cortegiano,3ocataliere, as distinction, 4zcelestial harmont', ro6Cellini, B., xxii-ixr'Cerberus, 79ce t ra (cithar a, cittern, kithara),

xxv, 7,84Chastel, A.

The Genius o.f konardo da Vinci,249

Chiron, 54Chladni, E. F. F.

Lntdeckungen ilber die Theoriedes Klanges, tt

Christentombment of, 58,7ystaSe represen tation, 7 )n

CiceroDe Republica, rc6

Cima da Conegliano, z8cithara, 7; see also cefr,?

cittern, t7, -1S

Clark, K., .1-1':

Catolo{uc ..t D':i'lngs trfLct rr.:',ir la Vitci in theCo/lrclr,,n of His Majestyllre Ki,rS at l\'indsor Castle,87

konardo da Virci, An Accountof his Dnelopment as anArtist, xxv,8, 4zn, 44n,zz8

clat,icembalo, rgclavichord, a47, 14g, 774clat'icordio, 93clock mechanism, 7)7, 752,

r6z-65Codice Laudense, S, rzColleoni, 4z; see also YeniceComo, 75, ro3comparisons

of the Arts, serious criteriafor, zzr-23

between arts that presentobjects in succession andin simultaneih,, zr8,227

between poetry, painting,music, zt7

clich6 arguments about theArts, zzo-zr

small sound from near/largesound from far, rzo

sound from thickJthin objects,L09, 722

ten thousand voices of flies/voice of single man, rz4

time of travel of thunder clap/lightning flash, rz7

see also analogies; bellCompdre, 4

INDEX

Conir?:e=.::r' of the ImmaculateCo:.i::on, 7on

contro:::::i:.por.er ci :..minion/power of

n,'r'- i.

continuous .'uanhhes, 216Cordier, 4cornetto, 18E

Correggio, 36Costa, L., 69craniomania, 56Cristofori. B., 166crown wheel, 163cupacupa, 783

d'Andrea, G., 26, z7Dante,87n, zzzDavid, King, z8Delacroix, zr8de Medici

court,3Giuliano, 86Lorenzo (Magnificot, xxiii, zz,

)7, )8,75Democritus, rz8d'Este, Alfonso (duke of

Ferrara, Modena), 74d'Este, Beatrice (wife of

Lodovico, duke of Milan),17, 74, 87n

d'Este, Isabella (wife ofFrancesco Gonzaga, duke ofMantua), 77, 79, 70, 72

de Toni, G. B.Fcste e Ciostre in Milano ai

Tempi di Leonardo, 4zndiminution, see fadingDonatello, 5o, 63drum, 168-85, r9r

chord, r8oflute, q9friction, ro5kettle, r79for mine exploration, 12opot with membrane, 79, r8zroll, 76snare, 176see also rommelpot

Dublin, National Gallery, z8Duke of Devonshire, collection

of, 58dulce melos, r74duration of blow, ro8

see also timedust, see vibration

echo, rr9, z3ofrom clouds, r15from staircase, r15inside bells, rr5see also sound

Emilia, 63equestrian monument, see

Donatello; Milan; \'enice;Verrochio, Andrea del

Esche, xviiEurydice, 79, U,84

F

INDEX

fadingof heat, 9,7of light, 99of odor, 99of refracted sound, rt5of sound u'ith distance,

720-27Fama, zoofanfare, xxir', r99fantastic element, in art, j9Fedengo da Montefeltro, r49Ferrara,36

court, 27, JoFerrari, C., 28, 48, fi, 5+, l.1jfeasts, festir.als, carneval,

masquerades, /esie,nnsthtrate, theatre,entertainments, 39, j1,;3-93

see n/so N{ilanFicino, \{., 4;rfirrr?:iorre delle cose inttisibili (the

shaping of the invisible,i.e., music), xxli, 79, ztr,ttt ttR

Flemish polyphony, 4, 6Florence, xxiii, 3, 6n, to, 42, 44,

77, zz6compania de San Luca, 3court, sr'e de MediciFeast of the Annunciation at

the Piazza S. Fehce,77nFestival of St. Giovanni

Battista, r9rhumanist tradition, 4Museo dell' Opera del

Duomo, 9on,2o2Museo Nazionale, 62, 63musical life in, 3-4Neoplatonic tradition in, 4Ospedale di Santa Maria

Nuova, r93San Lorenzo, 6r, 63San Marco, z7Utfrzr, 28, 48, 5r, 5z

flute, glissando, 792-95folk instruments, 38, r87-gt'Fontainebleau, r99tlFra Antonio da Bologna, 3oFra Bartolommeo, z7Fra Giovanni da \Ierona, fi3,65Francesco di Viola, z7Franchino, see CaffuriusFrancia, 7o, 7rFranco, B., 6ofriction causing sound, ro6Fumagalli, G.

Gli Omini Saluatichi eli

Leonardo, STfwies, 79,83fus6, t6z

Gabriel, archangel, 48, Vn, 8qGaddiano, A., xxir, zzGaffurius (Gaffuri), F., )-9, ,4,

2c,6, 272portrait of,8,9

Caleazz.r da S::r Severino,house t-i. +:. S+, 85

Galen, r i: , :. -i:Galilei \..

Dul..t: ;iii.r \'.usica Antica etjriJ; .\lLr.iarnn, 7, 25, t6"q

Ganassi, S.

R;-1'..i4 R;,btztinn, z7Cnlamebt:. qzCaudentius, 36gergenn'erk, see viola organistaCenoa,

-5

Chiera d'Adda, rr5Chironda, r4-1

Ciorgione, qt. 62, 61Ciotto, r-1rCiovio, P., x-riii-rriv, 72, 74, 75Gloria (allegon' ofJ, zooCoethe, zr8Coito, r8Goldscheider, L.

Leornrdo da Vinci, xxlitrGonzaga archives, 19; see also

d'Este, MantuaGoodendag, J., 5, 6graces, 76grntticembalo, rgGubbio, z8Guidonian hand, 93Bun, see noise; soundCusnasco, L. (da Pavia), 3,

Hades, 83, 84Hafdecki, A.

Di.' If.r/i.rrrisiri Lr.t 'lt Braccio.Einc krrrrsl-ft rsttrrrscfu c Strrille:ri r Cex i iclll.' ,Jq'r I '1.lrrra.

38Hals, F., r83hammer, ro8, ro9; see ,r/x, blon'Hampton Court, 61harmony

of water falls (fountain), 9,rscience of, ro4n

harpsichord, r7hats, shape of, 84Hayden, H., r45, t+7, a1oheat of the sun/ 99Helmholtz, H. von

Lehre tton den Tonentpfindungen,toz, t86

Hermitage (Leningrad), 7oHerzfeld, M.

La Rappresentazione della"Danat" Organizzata da

Leonardo, 7Zn, 78nHeydenreich, L.

Leonardo da Vinci, xxiv,8Homer, z8horn, rr7

canon played by a singleAlpenhorn, tzz

cavities in the ground used aspart of, rzz

hunting, rrzpitch, rr3sounding boards, ro4n

horse skull ins::urnen:, xxiv,xxv, 19, ++

horses, Leonardo's studv of, 42hurdy-gurdr', r_i8, 168

imaginationstimulated bv visual or

acoustical sensations, r34t15 see also analogies

improvisation, see musicalimprovisation

inner ear, tz9-31; see alsoanatomY

Institute de France, 44Isaac, H.. r.17Isabella d'Aragonia, n, 75, 76Italian sh'le, 6

Jaquotin, .1

Joseph of Arimathea, 58Josquin Des Prez, 4

Jopiter,76, V

keg, rr1keyboard, 154, 155, r57, t68key mechanism, $o, rg5-97Kircher, A.

Musurgia Unit,ersalis, r4Zkithara, 54

La Cecca, 71nLanfranco,27,16Larissa, 77Lauts, J.

lsabella d'Este, t9Leo X, pope, zz, t-66, zz4Leitzmann, A.

W. A. Mozarts Leben, t35Leonardo da Vinci

Adoration of the Kin$, |+nAdoratiorr o.f the Magi, qz, 4qAnghiari Battle, 4zbook on anatomv, 2o9book on musical instruments,

7L2t1

church architecture andanatomv of heart, 79, 8z

"Conclusion of the poet,painter, and themusician," 217

contradictory tendencies of,224

designs of monsters, 1j"How music should be called

the younger sister ofpainting," zro

Il Trattato del Moto e Jlisuradell'Acqua, rc1

and improvement of socialstatus of the painter inanalogy with that oi themusician, xxii, r-1, zr9

and Latin, 1oJl,The Madonna and Chil,l icith St

lohn, zz8

2)7

48

-\l&irrrru tVirgin) of the Rock,8, 3o, 67, 7o

as mathematician, toand mechanics,1,o, 1,3

methodology of, 4, 97and music, xxi-xxvas musical improvisor, 74musical notation of, 9j"The musician speaks with

the painter," zrzmusic ranked after painting,

xxinatural science ranked after

mathematics, 16"Of the difference and again

the similarity betweenpaintin8 and poetry," zo7

as painter, sculptor, architect,philosopher, musician,xxiii

"The painter uses degrees forthe objects appearing tothe eye, just as themusician does for thevoices received by theeat," 27)

Paragone, xxi, xxli, 6, t-64,204-23

peculiarities in Italian writing,7o9n/ 729n, 229-31

Portrait of musician, 8"Reply to King Mathias to a

poet who competed witha painter," zo9

studies of anatomy, 39,737-)3

terminology for noise, sound,'to4, 7o5

theatrical staging and designof Paradiso, 23, Z5-77; ofDanad, 74, 75, n-81

Trattato della Pittura (Treatiseon Painting), xxi, xxiii,4o, rz7, zo4-r8

and use of proportions, 16"What the difference is

between painting andpoetry," 2o5

Lessing, G.Iaokoon, zr9

Iiberal arts, xxi, t4, zr9Libva, rroIight

afterimage, tz3of sun, 99rvave theory, ro4r

linear perspective, see

perspectivelingering of sound in the object

producing it, r33, tlq; see

also analogies; music; timeLippi, Filippino, 4, 54, 55, to6nlira antiqua, z5lira da braccio, xxiii, 6, 7, 8,

25-39, 54, 57-72, 84, rzoassociated with the Greek

lyre,39,54

oow, 30mtthology and allegories,

)5-18rn shape of horse skull, see

horse skull instrumentsocial status and use by

virtuosi, 3o-34iira moderna, z5Lloyd, A.

Chats on Old Clocks, fizLodi, 5

Museo Civico, 5n,8, trLodivecchio, Benedictine

Cloister, 5Lodovico il Moro, see Sforza,

Lodovico il MoroLomazzo, xxii-xxvLombard

courts, 17; see also Ferrara;Mantua; Milan

cupola, 48Lombardy, 63Lorenzo Magnifico, see de

MediciLorenzo da Pavia, see Gusnasco,

L.loss of substance through sound

emission, tz8, tz9; *e alsoanalogies; comparisons;fadrng

Louvre, ;4nLucretius, rz8Ludens Geonteticus, zz6Ludwig, H.

konardo da Vinci: Das Buch aonder Malerei, zo4

Lunulae, 63lule, 1-2, a2oLuzio, A., 19

Ia cultura e le relazioni letterariedi lsabella d'Este Gonzaga,r7n, r\n

Delle Relazioni di Isabella d'EsteGonzaga con Lodoaico e

Beatrice Sforza, rTttEmporium, r.8nlsabella d'Este e la corte Slorza,

77nlvra (lyre), xxv,7,84

ancient Greek, 39, 54see also crthara; kithara; silver

lyre

MacCurdy, E.The Notebooks of bonardo da

Vinci, xvi.d.n, xiri,79n,rozn, ro6n, to8-ro, ttz,LL3, L75, L79, 124, 727,a2g, 7go

McMahon, A. P.Treatise on Painting by Leonardo

da Vinci, zo4McMurrich, J. P.

Leonardo da Vinci, theAruztomist, r1r

Madrid Codices, xvii, 16oMagdalene, 58

INDEX

mando:,a -SMantes..a u.ir', 63, 65

schrroi or 11, 54Mantua. :. l': 8, to,72,28, 30

Chapel ol St. .{ndrea, 63Castello, r!Gonzaga covrl,5,75Marmirolo, ;.1, 79Palazzo Ducale, 7o

Manutius, A., r8Marcolongo, R.

Leonardo da Vinci Artista-Scienziato, xxv, 97

Marinoni, 4.,75n, 47I Rebus di konardo da Vinci,

raccolti e interpretati, 9on,93

The Writer, kotardo's LiteruruLegacy, xvli

Mats,63nMarsyas, 28, 29, )jMarzocco, 63mascherate, 51,; see also feastsmasquerade costumes, see stage

costumesMatelda, 87nmathematics, to, 73, 7o4nMathias Corvinus, King, zroMaximilian Habsburg, 74mechanics, 10, 1); see also

LeonardoMedici, see de MediciMedusa, 4oMeller, P., 87nMelzi, F., 2o4, 279Memling, H., zozmemory, 222Mercury,76,84Mersenne, M.

Harmonie Uniaerselle, r83metal symbolism, xxivMetropolitan Museum of Art,

xviii, 19, 47, 58n, Zon, 77,78t1, 9on

Michelangelo, 6oMigliorotti, A., xxiii, 3, 7, zz, 83Milan, 3, 5, 6, 18, )o, 32, 42,

71-75,78n, 45Ambrosiana, 8, 4onCapella del Duomo, 4, 5Castello Sforzesco, 226; Feste

del Paradiso in, 75, r83;equestrian monument at/xxl,39, 42, 44

coutt, a7, j9, 147Duomo, xviii;library, 6French capture ot,6n, t8,71Gymnasium, 5musical life in, 3, 4palace of Caleazzo da

Sanseverino,4z, 7,1

palace of Giovan FrancescoSanseverino, 74

see also SforuaMilanesi, G.

D ocument i inedit i ris guar dant iLianardo da Vinci, zzn

II

INDEX

mine, 12Ll

mirror, 115

Modemo. 26, z3Moissac. r.1rmonocordo, monacordo,

manicordio, 92, 93, a4Z,749, 771

monostichon, z8monsters, 11, 40Montagna, 8., 28, 3oMonte Oliveto, 163lvlorelli, 8mortar, see noise; soundMozart, W. A., xxv, r35Muller, J.

Barthel Beham KritischerKatalog, 86, 87

Miiller-Walde, 86musette, 199music, xxii, xvii, zo4-23

basic flaw of, la malattia dellamusica (the all-toonuickfading of the tone), 97,zo8, zrg

box (Swiss), r9rhistorians, xxiloud stage, 77mathematical, 35and painting, 274,2a9philosophy, xxirepetitiousness, zzosee also t'igurazione

musical accompaniment, 78nmusical improvisation, xxi, 3,

22, 25, 10, )5, 38, 39, 70, 71,83

musical instruments, xvii, xviii,xxi, xxiv, 77, 18,92,93,97,704n

bowed-blown, 48, 5oconsonance, r8oinventive and fantastic, 39,47see also arlos; bagpipe; bell;

bow; cithara; cittern;clao icembalo ; clavichord;cometto; drum; flute;glissando; folkinstruments; horn;kithara; lira da braccio;lute; l)'ra; organ;organistrum; PiPeirommelpot ; silver lyre;spinette; spinnettina;trombones; trumpeuviola; viola organista;wind instruments; zither

musical jawbones, 47musical pitch, ro9musical score, 92musical syllables, 93

Naples, 5, roPiedigrotta festival, ro5

Napoleon l, 4on, 5rNeapolitan dance,76Netherlandish counterpoint, 6Nissen, G. N. von, r35

nol*Leonardo s subtlen' of

terminologl', 7o4, 7o5see a/i1 romore; sound;

strepido; tronitoof cannons, rvii, tzo, rz:

North Itaiiandecorative sh'le, z7humanist learning, z8lira da braccio, 3osee a/so Florence

nvmphs,76, V

odor, fading offlou'ers, 99nmusk, 99, rz9

Olvmpus, 7O'Malley, C. D., xvii

konardo da Vinci on the HumanBody, rffi

onion, rlror9an, 77, go, 7o4n, t16, zo1; see

also musical instrumentsorganetto, a7,2oo-o3organistrum, r4rorigin of sound, see soundornaments

from antiquity, z8North Italian, 2Z

Orpheus, 28,29,79,84orthogonal triangle, ro9Orvieto, z8Ottina della Chiesa, A.

The Complete Paintings ofkonardo da \/inci, 7on

OridMetamorphoxos lolgare, 28, i5Metamorphoses. book X\', zr3,

.r1

Pacioli, L., w;i, 1, 5, ro-16painting

and music, zo4, zo5, zt6and liberal arts, xxii

Palma Vecchio, J2, ))Pan, z8-zg, 15Panconcelli-Calzia, G.

Leorwrdo als Phonetiker, 98, 4zPanofsky, E.

The Codex Huygens andkonardo's Art Theory, 44n

Paragone, see LeonardoPassavant, G.

Verrocchio, 47 nPavia, 6, 17, 73; see also

GusnascoPedretti, C., 87n, 737, agan

Commentary on the LiteraryWorks of konardo da Vinci,L37, L91.

Leonardo da Vinci, On Painting,A Lost Book, zo4

percussion, see drumimpact, rrgn

Perseus, 48,51, n

239

perspectivelinear, in parning, xxii, 14,

zr9; of polvhedra, 13; andquadriuum, r3

in sight and heanng, xvii, zo9of sound, 99n5sg 4lyr ploportion

Perugia, roPerugino, 3oPeruzzi, z8Petrarch, zoophantasm, 86phantom, rt5Pictagora, rognPiero di Cosimo, 48, 5a, 52, j4npignato. t8)Pinturicchio, 35pipe, 112, 1,W, 197, 199Pirani, M.

Emanuel Mo6r, r38pitch of sound, rrr-r1; see also

musical pitch; soundpiaa (bagpipe, pipe), q7, r99Plato

Laws, 7Platonic "regular bodies," r3, r4plectrum, 84Pliny

Natural History, 4onPlutarch edition (Ferrara, t5ot),

36Pluto, 78, 79, U, 84Po, rroPoetry/ 205-11, 2r7, 22oPoliziano, 7, 8, 22, 1.o, 74, 25,

79, 83Pollaiuolo, )4, 35, 99n, 2L9Popp, A. E., 84pot, see drumPraetorius, M.

Syntagma Musicum, 38, a45,164, r83

propagation of sound, 7t)-15,see also sound

prophecies, r35proportion (numerical ratios)

in cosmogony, rroGaffurius's attitude toward, 6musical, to9n, zo6in musical harmony and in

painting, zt7, zr8, zzrPacioli's De Dipina Proportione,

13-16in painting, zo5; see also

perspectivein Paragone, 6, zo6-15, zzrproportionalita armonica, zr8in Pythagorean theorv, ro5,

zo6nof sound volume and

distance, rz5of time and space in sound

propagation, rz7see also harmony

Pucelle, j.The Book of Hours o.f leanne

d'Eareux, 47, 48

2-+o

Purl'.I):ng action/ 1ggPurgatorio, 87nputh, 6i, 65, 79Pythagoreans, 93, zr4

propoftion figures, 8

Quadrivium, xx1i, 14, zr9

ratchet mechanism, r79Raffaellino del Garbo, z8Raimondi, M., z8Raphael, xxiv, 4, 28, 1o, 36, 54Rebuses (picture-puzzle s), 9o-9)recorders, flauti dolci, 48, r9zreed instrument, 35refraction of sound: echo,

L75-79) see also soundReisch, C.

Margarita Philosophiae, t-32Renier, R., 79; see alsoLuzio, A.resonance (sympathetic

vibration), tzo; see alsosound; vibration

rhapsodes, z5Riccio, A., 3oRichter, J. P.

The Literary Works of Leonardoda Vinci, xviir't, xviii, xxv,1O2n, r7O, 12O, L37/ 79O,

224Rimini, fountain at, 9oRomagna in the Apennines, 122Romano, G., 4Rome, 6, 70,22,44, lo3, zz6

Villa Farnesina, z8rommelpot, t83romore, rc4, rc5, t81Rorschach test, 21, 1J5

Sachs, C.History of Musical lnstruments,

774Real-Lexikon der

Musikinstrumente, 166sacra conoersaziofie, 4t1, 12,70sacre rappresentazioni, 76St. Ceorge,63Santiago de Compostela, r4rSantillana, G.

Leonard de Vinci et l'expdriencescientifique au XVl" siicle,t6

Sappho, 7Saronno, Santuario (Santa lvlaria

Novella), 48-5o, r45, tq6Saunders, J. 8., see O'Malley, C.

D.sceptre, 84Schiavone, 35, 36Schubert, F., xxvSchwabacher, S.

Die Stickereien nach Entiuiirfendes Antonio Pollaiuolo ittder Opera di S. Maria delFiore zu Florenz, gort

scudi (shields), 47, 6o, 63

-rdlitz, W. voni ;lisegni di Leonardo da Vinci a

Windsor, 84, 86, 87Lronardo da Vinci, 8n, 44n, 7on

Seneca\atural Questions, 7o4n

senses, xviiSiorza, Anna (s'ife of Alfonso

d'Este), 74Sforza, Bianca lr{aria (daughter

of Galeazzo \laia), 74Sforza Book of Hours, 28, r44Sforza court, ro, 74Sforza, Francesco (father of

Lodovico), 4, 4zSforza, Galeazzo Maria (first son

of Francesco), 4, 4zSforza, Gian Galeazzo (son of

Galeazzo Maria), xxl, 71,75Sforza, Lodovico il Moro

(second son of Francesco),xxiii, 3, 5, 4, ;8,22, 42, 44,71-75, 77, a9)

Sforza, Massimiliano (first sonof Lodovico), 74

shawms, 76shoes, shape of. 84silver lvre, x\\', 70, 72Slxtus IV, pope, _t-+, Iskulls

animal, $, fu, 63horse, _t9--12, 17, 11,8, 59human, ;8. 6o

Solmi, E."La poiitica di Lodovico il

Moro nei simboli diLeonardo," 87

solmization (solfeggio), 93s)no, 7o4soul, r36sound

of bells, see bellsof blow, ro8of cannons (guns, mortars),

xvii, ro4, 7o5, r72,72oof celestial bodies, ro6of echo, rr5of flies, aa2, t24in the ground, rr5of hammer and anvil, ro8Iength determining pitch, xviilingering of, tzz, g), r34loss of substance through

sound emission, tz8, tz9loudness of, depending on

distance, rz5-27of mine excavation, rzoof organ pipe, ttzorigin, ro6-rrpitch, rrr-r3pitched/unpitched, ro4propagation, rr3-r5of reed, rr3refraction, rr5-zoof spirits, rrrsymbolic aspects, t35, t36

INDEX

three<:::-.ensional::-'::gation, tor

of th::.:e: rz7of i:l=.':r-:.e. rrzof in:r:'.-: horn, rr3velocitr- ,s-edi, 127, t28of vessel. :::of voice, tt2, t4volume and fading, 97,

tzo-27, zo8in water, rr5see also echo; noise

spinette, r7spinettina, in the Metropolitan

Museum of Art, r9-zrspirits,111stage costumes

female figure, 87, 88hunchbacked bagpiper, 87monster on horseback, 86prisoner, 84,85rider camouflaged as bagpiPe,

85, 86youth in three-tiered hat, 9oyouth on horseback 85, 86youth with lance, 87, 88youth with palm, 87, 88

stairs, rr7star of Bethlehem, Ornithogalum

umbellatum, rz5Steinitz, K.

Leonardo Architetto Teatrale e

Organizzator di Feste, 76n,77n, 78rt, 79

Leonardo da Vinci's Trattatodella Pittura, a bibliography,204

Stimmer, T., r83Stoa, Q.

De Syllabartm quantitate, 18stoics, rz8strepido, 7o4,1o5,78)Striggio, A., xxivstring of lute, rzoSuida, W.

kornrdo da Vinci, 8, 5r, 58nsun

heat loss, rz8qualities of, z3rlight, 99

svmbolic aspects of sound, t35,

,6

tabella di Marzocco, r9rTaccone,8., 78ntailoring of fabric, 84teschio, 56Theremin, L., r9zThirty Years' War, 38Ticino, rrot'tme, zz6

consumed by a blon', ro8consumer of all things, zr3,

tt^ ttA

the great consumer (fading ofsound), 167

lINDE\

memLrrr'3s !-l!-tor over time/2,$

modrtl-rns shapes of livingbeinqs, z:6

music, as art "in time," 6Tinctoris. i..;,6Titian. xxir', qrr

Tours museum, 61tovs, rE7-9rTrauman Steinitz, see Steinitz,

K.trombones, 76, trztronito, ro5, r83Truchado, Fray Raymundo, r-17,

t66ntrumpet, ry4, a99Turin, Pinacoteca,28, 53, 5q

Uccelli, A.Leonardo da Vinci: I Lihri di

Meccanica, Lon, 171Ufh.zi, see FlorenceUgolino, 8., zz, 3o; see also

musical improvisationunicorn tapestries, 2o1universe

conceplion ol unity, 97, 98creation, rro

Urbino, )o, )2, r49Duchess of, zrPalazzo ducale, 28, 1z

Valla, G., r38Vasari, G., xxii-xxv, 4o, 48n, 5t,

72, 224Le opere rli G. Vasari, 75nLe Vite degli Artisti, 73n, 75,

8)nvase/ 1ogVatican

Appartimenti Borgia, 35Belvedere, r66llbrary, zo4Segnatura, )6, 54n

velocity (speed) of sound, rz7,t-28; see a/so sound

Venice, 6n, ro, ro1Colleoni monument, 44, 46,

47, 72

fun \larrr. h.-:-sr. .1:Santa \la::a i:i r.)rgano. z9San Z:ccana. :9, iz

Ventun. -{ . S

Verona :: :SSan Zeno. o,:

Verrrxchro. .\ndrea del, _i, tl,

\-ersarlles, rggnvibrahon

of anvil. rtrSof bel1, ro9caused bv borving, rrroi dust, 1o9. 1r1of flv rtings. rrrof hammer, ro8

ViennaCongress, 4onKunsthistorisches Museum,

27viola, 9o, 92, g); see rllso lira da

braccioviola organista, xxv, 167Virdung, S.

Musica getutscht, ry7, fi1virtues, 76Vitruvius

De Architectura, ao1, a)7n|toce,7o4voice, rz4, zr3

articulation, r r rporver of, ro.4tproduction, rz9-33of spirits, rrr

volume and fading of sound,720-27

dependence on distance, rzodependence on length of

mortar. 12rdependence on n'eather, rztsee also sound

Washington, National Galien.,36n

water wavescaused by pebbles, 7o-t, to2,

77)circular wave, 1oJr,, t73, 175eddies on top and bottom,

101

experimen:s ..: or.-uiarwaves : i

_1

interference r.r:Weerbecke, G. r'an. xviii, 4Willaert, A., .2.;

wind chest. 2oo, 2olwind instruments, 192-2ojWindsor

castle. zztrcatalogue, 86

Wintemitz, E.Atatonry the Teacher-On the

IrttP'QsS sS Leonardo'sAndtonical Research on his.\lusirzl and OtherTldchines, t), 4on,79n

BagP4,e, and Hurdy-Gurdies inTlrcir Social Settings, r99

Bagptp,es ior the Lord, 48nGnagtToa, Trazonr: An Essatl on

.\ftr:nrl's Script, Pastimesartd Nonsense Letters, t35

"Engelskonzert" in Die Musikin Ceschichte undCegenitart, zzn

Les F?tes de la Renaissance, 74n"Lira da braccio" in Die Mttsik

in Geschichte undCegenurart, zzn

A Lira da Braccio in GiooanniBellini's "Feast of theCods," 16

Musical Archaeology of theRenaissance in Raphael's"Parnassus," 54

Musical Instruments and TheirSymbolism in Western Art,57nt 14o

Musical lnstruments for theStage, 7on

Young, Thomas, rr,g

Zata, roZarlino, 32, 36zither, rrvZubov, \/. P.

Leonardtt da Vinci, 1on. lon,702t1. 777n

241.

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Leonardo da Vinci as a musician

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