A decades-long argument about one of the most famous artists in the world may have finally concluded.
Best known for his work such as the Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci and his life are a mystery yet to be uncovered by scholars who have studied the artist’s life for centuries now.
The vague details of the painter’s life have fueled the fires of debate about the layout of his life.
In recent years, the one question that many interested parties have is who is truly Leonardo da Vinci’s mother? Where did she come from? What was her early life like? Who was the woman who gave life to the “Renaissance Master?”
A few facts have been discovered about the women in question. Her name was Caterina.
Leonardo was born on April 15th, 1452, by an illegitimate product of her relationship with a young Florentine notary named Ser Pierdo da Vinci. Leonardo was baptized and a memorial tablet (or as many of us know as a birth certificate) recorded his birth in the Church of Santa Croce in the town of Vinci.
On Tuesday, March 16th, 2023, in Florence, author Carlo Vecce would present his new novel “IlSorriso di Caterina,” or “Caterina’s Smile,” based upon a newly discovered document
handwritten by Leonardo’s father dated November 1542 which would make Leonardo around 6 months old. The document had been discovered in the State Archives of Florence.
The document contained an act of liberation of a slave called Caterina by her mistress Monna Ginevra, who was the wife of a “Florentine adventurer,” who owned slaves from the Black Sea region.
“At the time many slaves were named Caterina, but this was the only liberation act a slave
named Caterina Ser Piero wrote in all his long career,” Vecce stated in an NBC News interview. “Moreover, the document is full of small mistakes and oversights, a sign that perhaps he was nervous when he drafted it because getting someone else’s slave pregnant was a crime.”
If the document does point toward Leonardo’s mother Caterina, this could mean that Leonardo would be half-Italian, and his ancestry is full of history.
The mysteries of Leonardo’s life, mainly his mother’s identity, are still unknown. With new evidence and feisty scholars constantly fighting over the many theories, this document may have solved a mystery to the art world itself.
