The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

October 10, 1517.
In one of the outlying parts [of Amboise], Monsignor This refers to Cardinal Luis of Aragon, for whom the author served as secretary. and the rest of us went to see Mr. Leonardo da Vinci original: "Messer Lunardo Vinci", the Florentine. . . . This gentleman has written about anatomy in great detail, showing through illustrations the limbs, muscles, nerves, veins, ligaments, intestines, and whatever else there is to discuss in the bodies of men and women, in a way that has never yet been done by anyone else. All of this we have seen with our own eyes; and he said that he had dissected more than thirty bodies, both of men and women, of all ages. He has also written about the nature of water, various original: "divers" machines, and other matters, which he has recorded in an infinite number of volumes, all in the common language original: "vulgar tongue" — meaning Italian, the language of the people, rather than the scholarly Latin.. If these should be published, they will be useful and very enjoyable.

(Excerpt from The Journey of Cardinal Luis of Aragon through Germany, the
Netherlands, France, and Northern Italy, 1517–1518, written by Antonio de
Beatis. Edited by Ludwig Pastor and published at Freiburg im Breisgau A city in Germany., 1905.)