Leonardo died 500 years ago on May 2 in the Loire Valley town of Amboise, where he was the prestigious guest of French King Francis I for the last three years of his life. The Florentine master brought with him three of his favorite paintings: the Mona Lisa, the Virgin…
Unable to attend school because he was an illegitmate child, Leonardo is one of the world's most famous self-taught geniuses. He actually wore his lack of schooling as a badge of honor -- calling himself an uomo senza lettere, a man without letters. His Italian was laced with the local…
Like many left-handed people of Leonardo's era, he habitually wrote backwards. A by-product of being excluded from a normal education because he was an illegitimate child is that no one discouraged Leonardo from preferring his south paw. Contrary to the widespread belief that the practice was a way for lefties…