Proyecto Leonardo da juego PResentación del IES Francés de Aranda

2. Index
 Introduction.
 Anatomy research.
 Knowledge about human anatomy.
 Methods.
 Drawings.
 Comparison between nowadays knowledge
and Leonardo’s drawings.

3. INTRODUCTION

4. Leonardo da Vinci
 He was a painter, sculptor, architect, musician, engineer,
mathematician, inventor, anatomist, cartographer,
geologist, botanist and writer.
 He is widely considered to be one of the greatest painters
of all times and perhaps the most diversely talented person
to have ever lived.
 In Leonardo’s manuscripts specular writing was used,
which consists of writing in the opposite direction, from right
to left, so that it is only recognizable if it is reflexed on a
mirror (writing in left-handed mirror script)

5. Leonardo’s life
 Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was born on the 15th of April
1452, in Vinci (Toscana, Italy).
 He died on the 2nd of May 1519, in France, when he was 67
years old.
 He studied with the famous painter Andrea de Verrocchio,
and then he worked with Ludovico Sforza. He worked
around different Italian cities and he spent his last years in
France, invited by Francisco I.

6. Contributions
 Art:
 Quattrocento: tridimensional representation system.
 Sfumato: technique consisting of the difumination of
the outlines.
 Really famous pictures as The Last Supper, The
Gioconda or The Vitruvio Man.
 Science: studies about the flight of the birds, the
movement of water or turbulences.

7.  Medicine: studies about human anatomy (bones, muscles,
the heart…) and about animal anatomy (cows, birds,
monkeys, bears, frogs and horses)
 Engineering: flying machine, parachute, future helicopter…

8. ANATOMY RESEARCH

9. Anatomy before Leonardo´s studies
Little was known about
anatomy until Leonardo,
because in that time
dissections of human
bodies were not allowed
so nobody knew anything
about anatomy. The
Inquisition persecuted
whoever tried to research
about human or animal
anatomy.

10. Leonardo’s knowledge about anatomy
His anatomical training started
when he was working with
Andrea del Verrochio, studying
the external parts of the human
body. Later, with the approval of
several Italian hospitals, he
practised the dissection of
corpses. Working conditions
were very bad because of
hygiene and the conservation of
the bodies. In 1510, together
with the doctor Marcantonio
della Torre, they collected
several studies about anatomy
with more than two hundred
drawings made by Leonardo.

11. Expansion and understanding of his
studies
The studies about human
anatomy were a great step for
knowledge and thanks to them
many things have been
discovered about our body,
that without Leonardo wouldn’t
have been possible. For
example, he discovered how
blood passes constantly
through all the human body,
carrying nutrients to every part
and collecting waste products.
He also made incredible
studies about the muscles and
valves of the heart.

12. Methods
First, he made
dissections of the corpses
of criminals very
discreetly, avoiding the
action of the Inquisition.
Later, when he began to
be famous, some
hospitals offered him
human bodies for his
research. After the
dissections, he fixed his
conclusions in amazing
drawings, that were kept
together in a notebook.

13. Drawings
The drawings were discovered recently because Leonardo
gave his notebooks to his student Melzi. When he died, his son
sold them to an Italian painter, who saved them all together.
The pictures appeared about 1900.

14. COMPARISON BETWEEN
NOWADAYS KNOWLEDGE AND
LEONARDO’S DRAWINGS

15. Leonardo’s heart

16. Leonardo’s heart
 The previous drawing shows different perspertives of the
heart. In relation to this organ, Leonardo studied its parts
with great accuracy. Moreover, he knew about the valves
and blood vessels of the heart.
 The blood vessels are perfectly drawn, even coronary
ones (coronary vessels supply blood to the heart
muscle).
 He was capable of studying the structure of the different
valves (atrioventricular and sigmoid valves).

17. Leonardo’s
heart
A great drawing of
the trachea and heart
can be observed
(c.1511), as well as
the bronchi and
bronchioles. He
wrote about the
action of the heart
and the effects of
respiration in the
trachea around the
drawing.
Drawing of a bovine heart,
great vessels & bronchial
tree: A bovine heart was
used for most of his
dissections.

18. Leonardo’s
heart
This sketch shows the
four cavities of the
heart: two atria and two
ventricles. He knew
perfectly its structure,
even the way valves
work during the cardiac
cycle.

19. Knowledge of the heart nowadays

20. Knowledge of the heart nowadays

21. Knowledge of the
bronchi and bronchioles
nowadays
Referring to the bronchi and
bronchioles, Leonardo
represented them almost
perfectly, but nowadays we
know more in detail their
function. The final branches
of the bronchioles lead to a
series of riny sacs, the
pulmonary alveoli, where gas
exchange takes place.

22. Other important
anatomy
discoveries
 He made very accurate
drawings of bones and muscles
(for instance, the structure of the
hand). Those drawings show
perfectly the structure of
tendons, bones and muscles.
 He studied the movement of the
diaphragm in the respiration and
defecation.
 One of his most ingenious
achievements in anatomy, were
wax moulds of the brain
ventricles.