Leonardo da Vinci's Plan for the Re-Design of Milan - Case Study Example

Leonardo da Vinci is most commonly thought of as a great painter who lived during the time of the Italian Renaissance, making significant contributions to the world of art. He produced several material works of art that continue to be revered. His artistic techniques were recorded regarding his use of color and light to create more realistic, dimensional images on a flat surface. The word ‘Renaissance’ literally means ‘rebirth,’ but “the term ‘Renaissance’ might now be defined as a model of cultural history in which the culture of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Europe is represented as a repudiation of medieval values in favor of the revival of the culture of ancient Greece and Rome.”1 The Renaissance period is characterized mostly by a renewed focus on the symbolism and skill represented in the artworks of the ancient world. This renewed focus on learning and knowledge encouraged the curious Leonardo to explore all his interests in nature and life. Discovering how things work had fascinated him since he was a young boy in the Italian countryside. More than just painting, Leonardo displayed a particular genius in investigating many subjects, constantly learning, observing and making hypotheses that he would test out whenever he could. During his life, da Vinci took time out from his art to re-design cities, sketch out canals and invent war machines. He kept large collections of these sketches that also show his interest in birds and other flying things. These studies led him to investigate different possible types of flying machines and the instruments that they would need aboard. Demonstrating a genius for invention and insightful inquiry centuries ahead of his time, it can be argued that Leonardo da Vinci is as famous as an early engineering genius as he is as an artist. By all accounts, Leonardo’s interests in science and the arts emerged at the same time from the same source of creative genius. “From a very early age, Leonardo was fascinated by the wonders of nature and, indeed, he learned a great deal by observing nature … The inventions with which, in later years, he would amaze his contemporaries … had roots in that formative period. Biographer Giorgio Vasari reported that from earliest boyhood, Leonardo amused himself by drawing models of machines.”2 His studies included geometry as well as the mechanical workings of gears and winches, human anatomy, military machines and hydraulic engineering. The movements of air, wind, water, clouds, snow and rain also interested him as well as the anatomical movements of the birds and animals around him. He drew up plans for urban sanitary developments and structural fortifications and designed several machines that would not be realized for several centuries. The technology involved in making several of his ideas work would not be invented for quite some time, but the sketches and notebooks da Vinci left behind detailing his ideas suggest a tremendous understanding of the principles involved. To understand da Vinci’s engineering genius, this paper will look into his plan for the re-design of Milan, his sketches regarding the various canal systems he designed and his studies of aeronautics that led to the invention of instruments that wouldn’t be understood for centuries. Like many artists of his time, Leonardo depended on the support of patrons for his own survival. Because he had a reputation for not finishing his works on time, it was difficult for him to gain and keep commissions. He was also well-known for having very definite opinions regarding how his art should look, which sometimes worked against him in finding work. Trying to find employment any way he could, Leonardo wrote a letter to Duke Ludovico Sforza, the ruler of Milan, advertising himself as a military inventor and engineer. This was a good move because there was a lot of conflict in the land then as the various city-states argued with each other, other countries and the dominion of the Catholic church. However, soon after he arrived, there was a plague that spread through the city, killing about 50,000 of the citizens of Milan. Leonardo decided the reason for the plague and its quick spread was because of the overcrowded living situation and the garbage that was dumped in the streets. His plans for a re-design of the city included a series of waterways that would function to keep the city streets clean. This plan included a series of locks, canals and paddlewheels that would function to wash the streets.3 “He proposed to build a new city, breaking it up into towns of 30,000 each; there would be watercourses to carry off the sewage and the streets would be broad and airy, the width equal to the average height of the houses.”4 Leonardo’s ideas regarding how to redesign Milan to reduce the risk for disease were not realized in his lifetime. Several centuries later, though, the County Council of London declared his measurement of the width of the street compared to the height of the houses was the ideal proportion and used it to lay out their new streets.5 He also designed the streets to be built on two levels, creating a higher level for pedestrian use and a lower level for commercial use. In addition to this anticipation of potential traffic problems, Leonardo’s planning included the consideration of the streets’ practical use. To reduce the problem of vagrants defiling hidden landings on the stairways that would connect the levels, Leonardo designed the new city with spiral stairways. It is maybe not so surprising that Leonardo would not have much difficulty envisioning the flow of traffic, people and garbage along city streets since he spent a lot of time studying hydraulics and the flow of water. He had many inventions that had something to do with water, often going much further than others to test if they worked. His notes include descriptions of boat-shoes that would allow a man to walk on water, keeping their balance with a pole in each hand. To help people move in water, he designed webbed gloves that were like the webbed feet of water birds. “These would have probably been made in leather with five wooden ribs to stiffen them.”6 As a military engineer, he came up with the idea of a diving suit made out of leather with a leather air pouch and a set of cane hoses held to the surface with floats. In case that didn’t work, he also designed a diving bell. Other water inventions include the hydrometer (a device to measure the density of a liquid), the bilge pump and the sluice gate hatch. The sluice gate hatch was a device that could be added to the existing Milanese canal and weir system that would increase or decrease the flow of water around the gate so that it would be easier to open. His hydraulic ideas equaled the forward-thinking of these water-related ideas. “His studies for large-scale canal projects in the Arno River region of Italy demonstrate that he was an expert in hydraulic engineering.”7 While he was redesigning the city of Milan, “he drew plans for engineering works to improve the waterways of the Lomellina and its adjacent regions in the Lombard plain, vastly decreasing the danger of flooding.”8 Again falling under the direction of his patrons in 1500 Florence, he found himself working out just the opposite effect. “Leonardo was engaged in designing daring plans for the defense of the Isonzo valley, which he believed could be flooded to impede the march of the Turkish invaders.”9 Another very large scale plan was a navigable canal system that would link Florence to the sea. Like many of his other ideas, this was never implemented because of the expense and manpower it would require to complete the project. The idea was to create a series of giant steps and the use of locks every so often. The water in each lock could be raised to the next level with the use of a giant siphon and move the ships up into the hills.10 Like his studies into water, Leonardo was just as fascinated with the air. His notebooks are full of anatomical sketches of the wings of birds and bats. These lessons were then applied to concepts for various kinds of flying machines and related machinery. Most of these ideas centered around the concept of an ornithopter. This is a flying machine that’s powered by a man. The machine worked through a complicated series of stirrups, ropes and pulleys to help the flier flap the wings. They are pictured as taking off in an upright or standing position, but no evidence exists that the designs were ever tested. According to Wallace, though, these machines will never work because they depend on the muscles of a person’s arms and legs for power, “which together constitute about 22 percent of his total weight. In birds, the muscles used in flight constitute perhaps 50 percent of the total. When to this disadvantage one adds the dead weight of the flying machine itself, the difficulty of man-powered flight … becomes insuperable.”11 Later sketches indicate Leonardo might have realized that the human body didn’t have the strength to maintain flight. These included designs for an early form of helicopter and one thought regarding fixed wing flight. This ‘aerial screw’ is it’s called, was powered with the force of a spring coiled around the base. “It is thought that this is copied from the windmill game, a popular toy at the time which could be made to rise when spun with a string.”12 Other sketches indicate Leonardo understood the basic idea behind a wind glider in his use of the pilot’s position to navigate and operate the equipment. Only one set of sketches show the idea of fixed wing flight, though. In the sketch, he shows a study of how a leaf falls from the tree, zigzagging down the page. After this, he shows “four views of a man clinging to a flat winglike surface as he descends through the air. If he had pursued this idea, combining it with his knowledge of wind currents and propulsive forces … he might conceivably have launched a successful glider from a mountaintop.”13 Along with these designs for how to get into the air, Leonardo considered how to get back down when things didn’t go right. His parachute was made with wood poles and a linen curtain and has been proven to work. “Skydiver Adrian Nicholas tested Leonardo's design, jumping from a hot-air balloon at 3000 metres. He found the ride to be smoother than the modern parachute. However weighing over 90 kg, it put the parachutist in danger of injury on landing.”14 This goes to show that although he might not have had all the information he needed to launch people into flight, his studies, inventions and designs took the idea of flight as close as it could get without actually achieving it. He knew about the air currents and how air pressure could change, he knew how the wings of birds operated differently from the wings of bats and he knew why this was important. “With his penchant for looking far beyond the immediate fact, he designed devices for use after flight had been achieved – a wind-speed indicator; and inclinometer to show the aviator, lost in clouds, whether he was flying level or canted.”15 Although only a few of his major investigations and works have been explored, Leonardo’s notebooks are filled with many more inventions and designs in a number of different areas. Some of his more practical designs included the invention of a jack to help lift heavy weights, an alarm clock of sorts that functioned to lift his feet out of the bed after a certain amount of water had dripped into a reservoir and several instruments that helped him to measure time, distance, inclination and atmospheric humidity among other things. In 1502, he “drew a map of Imola that was amazingly accurate, the first real topographic map of a city.”16 In working for Cesare Borgia, he designed several military machines. These included the submarine, the tank and the automobile. To save his patron’s men from the dangerous recoil of the traditional cannons and backfire, he designed the ballista, a giant crossbow. This also provided the troops with a more accurate weapon to aim at their enemies. Several of his inventions paved the way for later ideas. The hydraulic screw operated with the force of slowly dripping water and was the early ancestor of the water turbine which wasn’t invented until the 19th century. His variable speed drive gear system wasn’t used for anything during the Renaissance, but is in wide use today in many of the transmission systems in modern automobiles. He made improvements to Gutenberg’s printing press that enabled it to be operated by one man alone with the aid of a screw, even though the designs were actually put into use until the 17th century. A file-cutter he designed used a threaded shaft to automatically control the movement of a file blank so that it was scored evenly by a trip hammer. At the same time, a falling weight was used to provide the power in a clockwork-type mechanism. This mechanism, applied to an industrial use, represents a step toward automation that would not be recognized for many centuries.17 Investigating the pages and pages of Leonardo’s remaining notebooks, it can be seen that his many inventions and designs were based on his early fascination with nature. In greeting the plague in Milan, he was able to deduce the unnatural crowded living spaces and habit of living close to the garbage heaps in the street could have led to the spread of the disease. His observations of natural spaces, the play of light along the street and the advantage of canals in keeping things sanitary helped him design an ideal city that was used as a model two hundred years later. The examinations he made regarding the properties of water enabled him to develop a large series of devices that measured all types of weather conditions. It also gave him the ability to envision canal systems that would bring ships to Florence through a series of locks, improve existing sanitation and canal systems and plan for the systematic flooding of areas as a defensive tactic. His careful study of the flights of birds and bats, as well as their anatomical makeup brought him to the very edge of the discovery of flight four hundred years before it was ever achieved. Although he hadn’t managed to achieve flight himself, Leonardo was able to develop ideas of how to assist an aviator maintain direction when above the clouds and of how an aviator can return safely to the ground “from any height.”18 His many other inventions provided blueprints for future engineers to study and develop, coming up with improvements and eventually finding ways to make these ideas work. Although some of Leonardo’s ideas are still not understood, what can be said with certainty was he was a keen observer of nature, a genius at making innovative connections and a bold designer of dreams. Footnotes 1 Campbell, Gordon. Renaissance Art and Architecture. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004, v-vi 2 Labella, Vincenzo. A Season of Giants: 1492-1508. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1990, p. 115 3 Whitcombe, Chris. “Leonardo da Vinci and Water.” H2O: The Mystery, Art and Science of Water. 2004. Sweet Briar College. April 10, 2006 < http://witcombe.sbc.edu/water/artleonardo.html> 4 Wallace, Robert. The World of Leonardo: 1452-1519. New York: Time-Life Books, 1966, pp. 55-56 5 Ibid. 6 Lee, Daniel. “Building the Best.” Superstructures of America. Katie Streten (Ed.). London: Channel 4, September 2002. 7 “Leonardo da Vinci.” Britannica Student Encyclopedia. 2006. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. April 10, 2006  8 Labella, 1990, p. 121 9 Ibid, p. 127 10 Whitcombe, 2004 11 Wallace, 1966, p. 102 12 Lee, 2002. 13 Wallace, 1966, p. 102 14 “Parachute.” Online Gallery: Leonardo da Vinci. 2006. British Library. April 10, 2006 < http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/features/leonardo/parachute.html> 15 Wallace, 1966, p. 102 16 Labella, 1990, p. 132 17 “Leonardo da Vinci Collection.” Samuel C. Williams Library. 2005. Stevens Institute of Technology. April 10, 2006 18 Lee, 2002 Works Cited Lee, Daniel. “Building the Best.” Superstructures of America. Katie Streten (Ed.). London: Channel 4, September 2002. “Leonardo da Vinci.” Britannica Student Encyclopedia. 2006. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. April 10, 2006  “Leonardo da Vinci Collection.” Samuel C. Williams Library. 2005. Stevens Institute of Technology. April 10, 2006 Campbell, Gordon. Renaissance Art and Architecture. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Labella, Vincenzo. A Season of Giants: 1492-1508. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1990. “Parachute.” Online Gallery: Leonardo da Vinci. 2006. British Library. April 10, 2006 < http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/features/leonardo/parachute.html> Wallace, Robert. The World of Leonardo: 1452-1519. New York: Time-Life Books, 1966. Whitcombe, Chris. “Leonardo da Vinci and Water.” H2O: The Mystery, Art and Science of Water. 2004. Sweet Briar College. April 10, 2006 < http://witcombe.sbc.edu/water/artleonardo.html> Read More