“How many emperors and how many princes have lived and died and no record of them remains, and they only sought to gain dominions and riches in order that their fame might be ever-lasting.”

Italian polymath of the High Renaissance

Leonardo da Vinci was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance, active as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. Born Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, he is best known simply as Leonardo. His reputation first rested on painting, but his notebooks made him famous in a broader sense. In them, he set down drawings and notes on subjects ranging from anatomy and astronomy to botany, cartography, painting, and palaeontology. He is widely regarded as a genius who embodied the Renaissance humanist ideal, and his work helped shape European art.