SOURCE: “Leonardo's Legend,” in ELH, Vol. 49, No. 2, Summer 1982, pp. 300-24.

In the following essay, which was originally delivered as a lecture in 1952,Gordon maintains that the twentieth-century image of Leonardo has been shaped by a variety of factors, including how he has been depicted in portraits; by his reputation as a “prophet” of modern science due to his studies of nature; by his characterization over the years as a “Renaissance man” or as the “uomo universale” of fifteenth-century Italy; by his being viewed as an “oracle”; and by Freud's analysis of him.

My subject is Leonardo's legend, the story of how Leonardo has lived in history. It is a remarkable story and begins early, probably in his own lifetime. I shall treat of it in four episodes, with a coda.¹

I the Image of the Magus

We are at the mercy not only of the verbal but of...