“Leonardo da Vinci produced many anatomical drawings and performed human dissections to better understand the human body.”

Da Vinci's most penetrating anatomical studies began in 1506 with his dissection of a 100-year-old man, whose peaceful death he had just witnessed. His earlier dissections and drawings were of animals — oxen, horses, a bear, and birds — and many of his first human images were anatomically inaccurate representations of received wisdom about the structures, functions, and connections of the human body. He acquired his first human skull in 1489, and the works displayed in this impeccably curated and beautifully presented exhibition take us up to 1513, during which time he dissected around 30 corpses.

In fact, sections were an important part of Leonardo's research. He initially participated in public sections, anatomizing various organs or body parts himself, and, by his own count, personally dissected 30 corpses in his lifetime.

Around 1506, in the Florentine hospital of Santa Maria Nuova, Leonardo met a patient over hundred years old, who felt no pain, only extreme weakness. After his death Leonardo performed dissection on the body: "And I conducted anatomy to find the cause of such a gentle death." He thus discovered that the blood vessels in an old man become twisted and occluded, causing death. Leonardo also utilized the dissection of the old man to fix normal human anatomy, especially that of the cardiovascular system, in images.

In the winter of 1510-11 Leonardo was working in the medical school of the University of Pavia alongside the professor of anatomy Marcantonio della Torre. He may have dissected up to 20 human bodies at that time and he recorded his findings on 18 sheets known as the Anatomical Manuscript A. Bones and muscles were now the focus of Leonardo’s investigations, rather than internal organs. The apparent ease with which Leonardo obtained permission to perform the dissections suggests that he now had some reputation as an anatomist.

The substantial body of anatomical studies... was the culmination of Leonardo’s research and studies spanning nearly thirty years, from 1485 to 1515. The Master devoted himself to this endeavor with exacting precision, basing his anatomical insights largely on hands-on dissections. It is believed that Leonardo dissected more than thirty corpses, examining their internal organs and sketching the various parts that composed the human form.

The artist had turned his attention to anatomy as early as 1487 in Milan – something that would occupy him for the rest of his life. While, on the one hand, they made the pioneering discovery that the heart’s system included four – and not just two – ventricles, on the other hand, Leonardo’s drawings of this, which recorded their discovery, depicted the heart’s septum as porous and permeable for blood, which he could not have observed on an exposed heart.

Leonardo moves from traditional sources of learning, namely Mondino, to combine them with knowledge acquired through dissection... In this first period of Leonardo’s anatomical studies, from about 1487 to 1493... late in life he mentioned that he had dissected more than thirty bodies.

Leonardo da Vinci produced over 200 detailed anatomical drawings based on his own dissections of human bodies, which he conducted secretly in hospitals and morgues. These studies allowed him to accurately depict muscles, organs, and skeletal structures far beyond the knowledge derived from classical sources.

Between 1489 and 1513 in the crypt of Santa Maria Nuova, Leonardo dissected more than 30 bodies of both genders and all ages. Leonardo performed his dissections at night by candlelight... Among Leonardo’s many gifts was complete visual recall. Once he saw an object, he could draw it precisely, and he did so after each of his dissections.

Early in his career, Leonardo relied on animal dissections and texts, but later performed human dissections himself, though some drawings retained inaccuracies from tradition. He dissected in hospitals like Santa Maria Nuova and collaborated with anatomists, producing precise drawings of human anatomy.

The Royal Collection at Windsor Castle holds approximately 600 anatomical drawings by Leonardo da Vinci, created between c.1487 and 1513, primarily based on his own dissections of human cadavers, though supplemented by animal dissections and earlier anatomical texts. Leonardo's notes confirm he performed around 30 human dissections despite legal and religious prohibitions.

Leonardo dissected about 30 people in the course of his life and made drawings for them... Leonardo began his anatomical studies in order to perfectly reproduce human bodies in his paintings. He believed that a work of art could only accurately represent reality if it was created with knowledge of the internal structure.

The study of embryos is one of Leonardo's most impressive anatomical drawings. However, it is certain that Leonardo did not dissect human embryos, but drew them from earlier sources.