1 When you think of multitasking, you might think about talking on the phone while doing your homework, but in the Renaissance, multitasking happened on a grand scale. Leonardo da Vinci was probably the best multitasker in history. He was an amazing scientist, architect, engineer, and artist. Leonardo excelled in everything he tried.
 
2     Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452, in Vinci, a sleepy town in the lush hills near Florence, Italy. His father was a public official, and his mother was a simple country girl. The two never married. Later, Leonardo's mother married someone else, so young Leonardo was raised by his grandparents. This strange family atmosphere may have made him somewhat reserved as an adult.
 
3     Leonardo's strong, wiry build made him an excellent hiker. He brought bugs, lizards, and bats into his room to study them. He didn't like to see animals in cages, though. When he saw songbirds for sale in the marketplace, he bought them so he could set them free. Leonardo also became a vegetarian, an unusual idea for his time, because he didn't want to hurt any living thing. He took many long walks to study nature.
 
4     On his hikes in the fresh Italian air, Leonardo also studied birds in flight. This fascination with flight inspired his later designs for flying machines. Centuries before airplanes roared across the sky, flying machines soared in Leonardo's imagination. He later wrote, "For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return."
 
5     Leonardo was constantly thinking, studying, and wondering. He carried a notebook around so he could jot down ideas or sketch. He had the unusual habit of writing backwards so his words could be only read by looking in the mirror. He could write well with both hands, which means he was ambidextrous.
 
6     Leonardo went to live with his father in Florence when his grandfather died in 1468. His father was so impressed with Leonardo's sketches that he showed them to a famous artist friend, Andrea del Verrocchio. Leonardo became the artist's apprentice and went to live with him. The young man drew, modeled with clay, and cast statues in bronze. He prepared paints by grinding colored minerals and mixing them with linseed oil or egg yolks. He also prepared wooden panels for painting by covering them with plaster. By 1472, he had become a master of the arts and joined the Painters' Guild.
 
7     However, Leonardo had some fun, too. He enjoyed having parties with the other apprentices, and they had a great time playing musical instruments and singing. Leonardo sang well and entertained his new friends with his jokes and lyre music. He was handsome and charming. He also had a scary sense of humor. He once made a "dragon" by adding wings, a horn, and big eyes to his pet lizard. He used this creative creature to frighten people. He watched with glee as they ran away screaming, probably studying their expressions like any good artist would.
 
8     Back at the job, Verrocchio made Leonardo his chief assistant. They worked together on a religious scene called The Baptism of Christ. Leonardo painted a beautiful angel, and when Verrocchio saw it, he realized that his student had far surpassed his skill. Instead of being pleased with his student's efforts, cranky Verrocchio gave up painting forever and concentrated on sculpture. Maybe his hard-hearted personality was better suited for working with rocks. His last painting is now in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy.
 
9     Leonardo appreciated his training under Verrocchio but was on his own by 1478. He did commissions for people. One of his most famous early paintings was the Annunciation. This painting shows the biblical story of how the archangel Gabriel appeared to the Virgin Mary to tell her that she would give birth to a son. Leonardo worked out the details of this painting with great care. He must have enjoyed this work because he actually finished it. Throughout his career, he often started projects with a flourish. Then, like an Italian cook who left half-baked manicotti in the kitchen, Leonardo would abandon his work.
 
10     Leonardo enjoyed researching the scientific details in this painting. He studied botany to be able to accurately show plants. He studied anatomy to be able to show the people's bodies realistically, and he even used a bird's wing as a model for Archangel Gabriel's wings. He made dozens of sketches to plan every detail. Leonardo always felt that beautiful art was based upon mathematics, so he created a formula for the perfect proportions of the human body.
 
11     Leonardo studied the human body with an almost morbid intensity. He did many drawings of nude models, and he made amazing anatomical drawings, such as a fetus in the womb. He even did dissections to figure out how muscles and bones were connected, or how joints worked. He encouraged fellow artists to make muscles look lean and reasonable in their paintings, not like "sacks of nuts." Some art historians wonder whether that comment was directed towards the great Michelangelo, whose massive muscled figures looked like Renaissance superheroes.
 
12     Even though Leonardo had the utmost respect for the proportions of the human body, he also had an aloof personality. He seemed charming, but he also had a surprising disdain for human beings. He once called men, "sacks for food" or even worse, "fillers-up of privies." He wrote many volumes of scientific and philosophical ideas, but he never seemed to have much love in his personal life. He seemed to like his scientific and engineering studies more than people.
 
13     In nature, Leonardo loved to study the behavior of water more than anything else. His notebooks are full of ideas for how to supply water efficiently to cities. He wrote that the swirls of water in rushing streams were similar to the spiral growth in the leaves of plants. Few artists or scientists, before or after Leonardo, had such a spherical view of the world. He had a remarkable talent for seeing how seemingly different subjects were connected in the larger scheme of things.
 
14     While pursuing his scientific work, Leonardo also started The Last Supper in 1495. This painting is in the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan and shows the final meal that Christ shared with his disciples. Da Vinci spent countless hours sketching the faces of the apostles, and he supposedly wandered through the streets searching for the right faces to use in his mural. Each morning he climbed up onto his scaffolding to work on his masterpiece. He forgot to eat or drink. He finished The Last Supper in 1497.
 
15     In 1502 or 1503, Leonardo went to Milan, where he painted what may be the most famous painting in the world. The model for the Mona Lisa was probably the wife of a Florentine man named Francesco del Giocondo. Leonardo worked on the painting for four years, and he kept the model well-entertained with jesters and musicians. According to stories, he didn't want a sad model. He succeeded, for the Mona Lisa's enigmatic smile has captivated viewers for centuries.
 
16     Leonardo entered the service of Giulano de' Medici, in 1513, but it didn't last long. The King of France heard about his many talents, and he invited da Vinci to come to France in 1516. Leonardo moved to a quiet house in Cloux, and he had an underground tunnel to connect his house to the palace. The king thought that Leonardo knew more about science, art, painting, and architecture than anyone in the world, so he gave Leonard a large salary. The King was probably right.
 
17     The great artist continued to work on artistic and engineering projects until his death in 1519. He was as precise in death as he was in life, and he even specified a certain number of candles to be carried at his funeral. His many notebooks were filled with ideas for inventions like the airplane, helicopter, parachute, and a bicycle hundreds of years before they were invented. Leonardo da Vinci, the greatest multitasker in history, will never be forgotten.