He was good looking, but never married and it is not recorded that he had a partner at any time. Leonardo must have been a rather unusual man for his-and probably also our-time. According to his will 60 beggars followed his coffin. It is here he died, 67 years of age, of a stroke on May 2, 1519. Leonardo da Vinci moved to Rome in 1513 to work in the Vatican and finally moved to France to serve king Francois I of France in Amboise at the river Loire. It is a rich source of information about Leonardo, which was bought in 1994 by Bill Gates for US$ 30 M from the millionaire Hammer and made publically available ( ). In this time also the Leicester Codex (compiled 1506–1513) was compiled. In the first years of the sixteenth century Leonardo spend time in several Italian cities (Venice, Florence, Milan and Rome). Not very modest but nevertheless true given that he painted Lady with an Ermine (1489/90 National Museum in Krakow) and The Last Supper (1495–98 Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan) in this time. In his application letter, Leonardo highlighted his abilities as a war engineer (he knew that this was what Ludovico was after) but ending with “Likewise in painting, I can do everything possible as well as any other, whosoever he may be”. In 1482 Leonardo went to Milan to serve Ludovico Sforza who became ruler of Milan in 1494. Already in that time Leonardo devoted time to drawing architectural and scientific matter. Leonardo lived and worked in his household for seven years, and according to Vasari, met many other important artists like Perugino and Ghirlandaio there. Andrea del Verrochio was a well-known painter, sculptor and gold smith. It appears that his abilities were noticed early and he commenced an apprenticeship with Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence at the age of 14. His father Piero da Vinci was an educated man from a family of notaries and his mother Caterina very likely a peasant. Leonardo da Vinci was born out of wedlock on Apclose to the village of Vinci in Tuscany near Florence.
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