I Disegni

Some work into a masonry dome

My foot and hand

A study of the Madonna, one of several I’ve made. I love drawing babies.

Leonardo: L’uomo universale (III)

« Dell’imitazione »

L’imitazione delle cose antiche è più lodevole che quella delle moderne.

“On Imitation”

The [practice] of imitation of ancient things is more praiseworthy than the imitation of that which is modern.

Translation Notes:

-If Leonardo’s literacy is evident of that which was most commonly accepted in late 15^th century Tuscan, spelling conventions have not yet adopted of the letter [z] instead of the final [t] used in descendents of Latin 3^rd declension <-tio, -tionis> nouns. Hence, in the original, his spelling of <imitazione> is rendered <imitatione> (the Latin original being <imitatio, imitationis>).

-He uses, for the adjective “praiseworthy”, the Latin form of the word (in its neuter form in the nominative and the accusative, which is the form that Italian later appropriated for ALL 3^rd declension adjectives): <laudabile>.

The modern equivalent is <lodevole>, indicating a phonological shift from the Latin /au/ to the Italian /o/, and the shift from the bilabial plosive [b] to the labiodental fricative [v].

In the Latin <laudabile>, the stress is on the antepult syllable (the [da]), and perhaps there’s some phonological rule that accounts for the shift from the short /i/ (also written [ĭ]) in the Latin to the /o/ in the Italian when this is the case. I’m not sure, although the other phonological shifts seem quite widespread.

Personal Notes:

As a proponent of Classicism, I agree strongly with Leonardo’s views here. So did Michelangelo, who, in his young adulthood, passed off sculptures of his own as those of Antiquity. Apparently, he was present at the unveiling of the famous Laocoön of Athenodorus, Polydorus, and Hagesander of Rhodes on the site of Nero’s Domus Aurea, and all indications are that he saw this sculpture as the greatest ever created. The influence of this sculpture is incredibly strong in many of his later works, particularly in the slaves originally intended for Pope Julius II’s tomb.

Helpful Links for Readers:

On the IPA

The Laocoön, a background of its sculptors and its history

The slaves of the tomb of Pope Julius II can be seen lower on the page here

Leonardo: L’uomo universale (II)

Leonardo scrisse il seguito riguardo alla fisiologia del corpo umano…

da Vinci wrote the following about what he perceived as the beautiful physiology of the human body:

Benché l’ingegnosità umana faccia le invenzioni varie, rispondedo coi vari strumenti a un medesimo fine, mai esso troverà l’inventione più bella, né più facile, né più breve della Natura…

Although human ingenuity may make various inventions (by means of various machines responding towards a common goal), it will never find an invention more beautiful, simpler, or more to the point than that which is made by Nature…

Translation Notes:

Leonardo apparently makes the following contractions in the original passage:

-Coi → co

-Un → u

He also makes the following vowel insertion (a process known as diphthongization and reminiscent of Spanish, where it is commonly found):

-Breve → brieve

Leonardo: L’uomo universale

Leonardo fu un uomo universale, competene in tutte le cose fece. Ma a parte dei suoi disegni, della sua ingegneria e la sua arte (come La Gioconda, Vergine delle rocce, L’Uomo vitruviano), nessuno conosce le sue scritte. Qui, vorrei mostrartene.

Leonardo scrisse la scienza naturale, la astronomia, le habitudini degli animali, la geografia, la lista continua…

Comincerò a tradurre per te:

Leonardo da Vinci’s writings are voluminous and cover so many different topics. I will translate some of them from time to time into a more contemporaneous reading. You can contact me for the original renderings.

«La Donnola»

Quest’animale, trovando la tana del basilisco, l’uccide coll’odore della sua urina sparsa. Ma l’ordore della quale urina uccide spesso la donnola stessa.

“The Weasel”

This animal, finding the den of the basilisk, kills it with the odor of its spilled urine. But often, the smell of this urine kills the weasel itself.

«Il Pittore»

Un pittore fu domandato perché faciendo le figure che erano così belle ma cose morte, faceva i suoi figli così brutti. A questo il pittore rispose che le pitture erano fatte di giorno, ed i suoi figli erano fatti di notte.

“The Painter”

A painter was asked why, having made paintings that were so beautiful (but in essence dead things), he begat children that were so ugly. To this the painter responded that the pictures were made by day—in the light—while his children were made during the night.

NB: In versione originale, Leonardo usa apparentemente “si” invece di “così”.

Note: In the original, Leonardo apparently uses “si” instead of “così” to mean “so”.

Forum Romanum (The Roman Forum)

Once a swampland, the Roman Forum was drained by Tarquinius Priscus around the early 6th century BC; by the 5th century BC, it was an established center for political and religious life in Rome. It is bounded to the south by the Palatine Hill, to the west by the Capitoline Hill, and to the northeast by the Oppian Hill.

Seen here to the right is the Temple of Antoninus and Fasutina, located at the eastern end of the Forum and first built in 142 AD, when the Roman Emperor Antontinus Pius dedicated it to his dead wife Faustina. Following his own death in 161 AD, it was dedicated again to his memory, and in the middle ages, it was rebranded as a Christian church—the Church of San Lorenzo in Miranda—which still stands behind the colonnaded facade of the original temple.