While Leonardo da Vinci is best known as an artist, his work as a scientist and an inventor make him a true Renaissance man. He serves as a role model applying the scientific method to every aspect of life, including art and music. Although he is best known for his dramatic and expressive artwork, Leonardo also conducted dozens of carefully thought out experiments and created futuristic inventions that were groundbreaking for the time."... This book is about Leonardo the scientist, and to fully write of his many accomplishments would require an encyclopedic mind. My intent has been to extract the essence of his story in the hopes that it would arouse the enthusiasm of a reader to further his interest in those other, more fully documented books-and, above all, in the notebooks that Leonardo himself wrote.-H. S. G."