INTRODUCTION

In the margin, in their proper places, we provide the summaries original: "arguments" of the writings and the figures.

To this end, and for each volume, according to the branch of science it treats, we have recourse to the help of a specialized scholar. For the first (Anatomy - Sheets A), we were valiantly assisted by Doctor Antonio Dionisi of Rome; for the present volume, we express our gratitude to Doctor Adolfo Villa, of the Surgical Clinic of the University of Turin.

We shall not speak here of the importance of the present volume. Leonardo is centuries ahead of his time, revealing unexpected wonders to those who study him ⁽⁴⁾.

The profound and subtle diligence of study, which appears here in these marvelous drawings and anatomical writings, is not limited to this science alone. The universality of his genius evokes an ineffable feeling of admiration and astonishment in all of us, whom the necessities of intellect and the ever-growing breadth of the scientific field constrain within the limits of specialized studies. While he paints and models the most marvelous works that honor the arts—sufficient in themselves to fill and make famous the life of one man—as the valiant soul he is, he also studies and writes (besides the Anatomy we are publishing) on painting, architecture, philosophy, physics, chemistry, astronomy, mechanics, hydraulics, geology, geography, botany, and zoology... not superficially, nor vaguely, but by engaging in diligent research and revealing new and profound laws, as well as minute details.

Of all this enormous labor, incomprehensible within the short span of a life as active as Leonardo’s, several volumes have already been published; namely: six large volumes of the Manuscripts that exist at the This likely refers to the Institut de France in Paris, where many of Leonardo's notebooks are held.

(4) Let us recall, for example, the studies and drawings of myology|The study of the muscular system and osteology|The study of the skeletal system, the comparisons between man and monkey (Folio 9 verso, page 63), the chapter: “Of the muscles that move the tongue” (Folio 28 verso, page 173 and following) where, passing from the anatomical field to the physiological, and then to philology|The study of language and historical texts and idealism, he gives us an admirable page of thought and modern philosophy; let us also recall the study on the crossing of the visual nerves This refers to the optic chiasm, where the optic nerves cross. (Folio 35 recto, page 215).