The life and work of Leonardo, the archetypical 'Renaissance Man' for whom no branch of knowledge was allowed to remain a closed book, has proved endlessly fascinating to later generations. At one time he was known only as a painter,
although many of his works were unknown and a number of inferior works by other hands -were wrongly attributed to him.
The full, amazing extent of his genius emerged only in quite recent times with the rediscovery of his notebooks and drawings. For a time, even Leonardo the painter seemed to be submerged by the weight of his new reputation as a scientist. Some
readjustment has taken place since then. As a scientist and engineer, Leonardo's achievements, though staggering enough, have proved to be a shade less novel than once we thought, while at the same time a succession of brilliant art historians, beginning with Bernhard Berenson and Kenneth Clark, have made
us far more knowledgeable about his art. Though Leonardo would have jibbed at such a judgment, he was and is, first and foremost, a great painter, a man whose output was tiny compared with other geniuses of his time (a Michelangelo, a Raphael, a Titian) yet includes possibly the two most famous paintings in history,
the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper.

D. M. Field read history at Cambridge University, England, taught English at a boys' school in New York, and later worked for several years for an international publisher of art books before becoming a full-time -writer in London. He is the author of many popular books on aspects of social history and the arts, including
a children's history of the Renaissance, Great Masterpieces of World Art, The Nude in An, etc.