DAVINCI'S SIGNATURE IN THE COSMOS

DA VINCI’S SIGNATURE IN THE COSMOS Dr. Robert D. Elliott (NCSU) Five hundred sixty­five years have passed since the birth of Leonardo Da Vinci on April 15, 1452. A recent discovery in 2005 of his painting of Christ, thought forever lost, now bursts upon the 21st century replete with a cosmic message proclaiming his understanding of the workings of the cosmos – born out in a heretofore unnoticed cryptic signature, discovered by the authors in 2010; and (revealed at the national SECAC Conference 2013).

During 2005 a badly overpainted Salvator Mundi (Christ as Savior of the World) was restored by Diane Modestini for NY art dealer Robert Simon.

An intact DaVinci original (1509) was uncovered, last seen in the collection of King Charles I in 1650.

Unlike the existing copies by Leonardo’s assistants, which showed Christ holding the traditional globe of the earth, Leonardo paints his Christ holding a rock crystal ball. Curiously, there are three very prominent white dots that break the crystal­like continuity of this sphere.

The authors hypothesized that these are stars forming a triangle and were possibly part of a constellation. In 2010, Dr. Elliott discovered that the prominent triangle made by these star­like spots could be linked to a known observable star­pattern in the sky ­ that found in the Constellation of Leo the Lion. Utilizing Photoshop to proportionally size and overlay the Leo Constellation of the modern sky chart atop Leonardo’s crystal sphere; the finding was that the angles in both were a precise match, even to the congruence of relative sizes of Leonardo’s painted stars and those in the actual Leo constellation. The heart star Regulus traces out the outer circumference of Leonardo’s sphere. Boldly Leonardo places his own star signature, as

court Painter, atop that symbol of Plato’s (and Christ’s) universe, the sphere.

Upon revealing our discovery to Dr. Simon, restorationist Ms. Modestini affirmed that the three spots were original to the painting.

Years earlier in the 1470’s, Leonardo had written on external factors related to optics, focusing on factors such as light and distance, revealing how these can be the cause of one object being more distorted or more visible that the other. From his subsequent experiments we know about ­ globes filled with bergamot oil, to a convergent lens (a telescope without an eyepiece) ­ Leonardo wrote, “construct glasses to see the moon magnified” (Codex Atlanticus, (fol.190 r­a))

He accompanied this with a sketch of a concave mirror with its caustic.

Leonardo went on to work for Pope Leo X’s brother Giuliano in Rome from 1513­1515. We know that he was developing instruments for and grinding a large concave mirror on the roof of the Vatican, and was eventually commanded to cease experimentation. There is good evidence for his optical studies having been funneled toward the development of a Pre­ Newtonian reflecting telescope.

For the cinquecento of Leonardo’s birth, a landmark volume authored by the worlds’ preeminent scholars, featured a mathematical analysis of Leonardo’s optical calculations made by Domenico Argentieri. Analyzing Leonardo’s calculations, he asks whether his telescope was designed only on paper, or actually constructed?

“Leonardo did actually construct his telescope, because it was only by means of experimentation that he could have observed the phenomena he describes; only experimentally and empirically that he could give the distances between the lenses, distances so different and yet so correct for the observation of distant and nearby objects… There are details in Leonardo’s investigations that can be understood and justified only from the point of view of the formation of images…

(His mirror was designed) with a radius of curvature of 20 ells; this proves that Leonardo was engaged in making mirrors with a focal length of 6 meters, with which he should have obtained a considerable magnification” (p. 424).

Thus from experiments with globes of crystalline glass filled with bergamot oil to his diagram with tube and calculations for grinding concave mirrors on a lead shell ­ it has been posited that Leonardo was engaged in making mirrors for a reflector telescope!

Bulent Atalay (NGS author) and Dr. Andre Buys in 2010 made further connections between DaVinci drawings and a probable telescope. Atalay quotes Leonardo, “In order to observe the nature of the planets, open the roof and bring the image of a single planet onto the base of a concave mirror. The image of the planet reflected by the base will show the surface of the planet much magnified” (Codex Arundel, c. 1513) Professor Buys reasoned that Leonardo’s telescope’s body drawing had been misinterpreted as one for a mortar centuries ago; and that the holes below the body in the base, were to hold a set of magnifying lenses (to augment the planetary image formed by the concave mirror, as an eyepiece does today). Further evidence for its actual use is found in a DaVinci drawing of 1513 of the moon, which seems to depict the crater Tyco ­ not visible to the naked eye!

During the last decade before his death, Leonardo completed his painting by placing his own star signature above the mystical crystal orb held in the hand of Christ as Savior of the Cosmos. He signed none other of his paintings except this one ­ utilizing a cryptic triangle from Leo the Lion seen exactly as it appeared overhead in April 1452. Written in the stars, the leitmotif of this ‘heretic’ and ‘magician,’ as his contemporaries had come to view him, would forever signal that Leonardo Da Vinci’s ideas, though willingly suppressed, would for a while preserve the skies’ virginity intact.

Visually he would bequeath them… through his calculations and notebooks… to us… in scattered evidential remnants ­ a riddle to be applied.