The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci

when it is large. Any one who grinds smalt should do it on plates of tempered steel with a cone shaped grinder; then put it in aqua fortis, which melts away the steel that may have been worked up and mixed with the smalt, and which makes it black; it then remains purified and clean; and if you grind it on porphyry the porphyry will work up and mix with the smalt and spoil it, and aqua fortis will never remove it because it cannot dissolve the porphyry. If you want a fine blue colour dissolve the smalt made with tartar, and then remove the salt. Vitrified brass makes a fine red. 729. STUCCO. Place stucco over the prominence of the….. which may be composed of Venus and Mercury, and lay it well over that prominence of the thickness of the side of a knife, made with the ruler and cover this with the bell of a still, and you will have again the moisture with which you applied the paste. The rest you may dry [Margin note: On stucco (729. 730).] [Footnote: In this passage a few words have been written in a sort of cipher—that is to say backwards; as in l. 3 erenev for Venere, l. 4 oirucrem for Mercurio, l. 12 il orreve co ecarob for il everro (?) co borace. The meaning of the word before "di giesso" in l. 1 is unknown; and the sense, in which sagoma is used here and in other passages is obscure.— Venere and Mercurio may mean 'marble' and 'lime', of which stucco is composed. 12. The meaning of orreve is unknown.] well; afterwards fire it, and beat it or burnish it with a good burnisher, and make it thick towards the side. STUCCO. Powder … with borax and water to a paste, and make stucco of it, and then heat it so that it may dry, and then varnish it, with fire, so that it shines well. 730. STUCCO FOR MOULDING. Take of butter 6 parts, of wax 2 parts, and as much fine flour as when put with these 2 things melted, will make them as firm as wax or modelling clay. GLUE. Take mastic, distilled turpentine and white lead. On bronze casting generally (731-740). 731. TO CAST. Tartar burnt and powdered with plaster and cast cause the plaster to hold together when it is mixed up again; and then it will dissolve in water. 732. TO CAST BRONZE IN PLASTER. Take to every 2 cups of plaster 1 of ox-horns burnt, mix them together and make your cast with it. 733. When you want to take a cast in wax, burn the scum with a candle, and the cast will come out without bubbles. 734. 2 ounces of plaster to a pound of metal;— walnut, which makes it like the curve. [Footnote: The second part of this is quite obscure.] 735. [Dried earth 16 pounds, 100 pounds of metal wet clay 20,—of wet 100,-half,- which increases 4 Ibs. of water,—1 of wax, 1 Ib. of metal, a little less,-the scrapings of linen with earth, measure for measure.] [Footnote: The translation is given literally, but the meaning is quite obscure.] 736. Such as the mould is, so will the cast be. 737. HOW CASTS OUGHT TO BE POLISHED. Make a bunch of iron wire as thick as thread, and scrub them with [this and] water; hold a bowl underneath that it may not make a mud below. HOW TO REMOVE THE ROUGH EDGES FROM BRONZE. Make an iron rod, after the manner of a large chisel, and with this rub over those seams on the bronze which remain on the casts of the guns, and which are caused by the joins in the mould; but make the tool heavy enough, and let the strokes be long and broad. TO FACILITATE MELTING. First alloy part of the metal in the crucible, then put it in the furnace, and this being in a molten state will assist in beginning to melt the copper. TO PREVENT THE COPPER COOLING IN THE FURNACE. When the copper cools in the furnace, be ready, as soon as you perceive it, to cut it with a long stick while it is still in a paste; or if it is quite cold cut it as lead is cut with broad and large chisels. IF YOU HAVE TO MAKE A LARGE CAST. If you have to make a cast of a hundred thousand pounds do it with two furnaces and with 2000 pounds in each, or as much as 3000 pounds at most. 738. HOW TO PROCEED TO BREAK A LARGE MASS OF BRONZE. If you want to break up a large mass of bronze, first suspend it, and then make round it a wall on the four sides, like a trough of bricks, and make a great fire therein. When it is quite red hot give it a blow with a heavy weight raised above it, and with great force. 739. TO COMBINE LEAD WITH OTHER METAL. If you wish for economy in combining lead with the metal in order to lessen the amount of tin which is necessary in the metal, first alloy the lead with the tin and then add the molten copper. How TO MELT [METAL] IN A FURNACE. The furnace should be between four well founded pillars. OF THE THICKNESS OF THE COATING. The coating should not be more than two fingers thick, it should be laid on in four thicknesses over fine clay and then well fixed, and it should be fired only on the inside and then carefully covered with ashes and cow's dung. OF THE THICKNESS OF THE GUN. The gun being made to carry 600 Ibs. of ball and more, by this rule you will take the measure of the diameter of the ball and divide it into 6 parts and one of these parts will be its thickness at the muzzle; but at the breech it must always be half. And if the ball is to be 700 lbs., 1/7th of the diameter of the ball must be its thickness in front; and if the ball is to be 800, the eighth of its diameter in front; and if 900, 1/8th and 1/2 [3/16], and if 1000, 1/9th. OF THE LENGTH OF THE BODY OF THE GUN. If you want it to throw a ball of stone, make the length of the gun to be 6, or as much as 7 diameters of the ball; and if the ball is to be of iron make it as much as 12 balls, and if the ball is to be of lead, make it as much as 18 balls. I mean when the gun is to have the mouth fitted to receive 600 lbs. of stone ball, and more. OF THE THICKNESS OF SMALL GUNS. The thickness at the muzzle of small guns should be from a half to one third of the diameter of the ball, and the length from 30 to 36 balls. 740. OF LUTING THE FURNACE WITHIN. The furnace must be luted before you put the metal in it, with earth from Valenza, and over that with ashes. [Footnote 1. 2.: Terra di Valenza.—Valenza is north of Alessandria on the Po.] OF RESTORING THE METAL WHEN IT IS BECOMING COOL. When you see that the bronze is congealing take some willow-wood cut in small chips and make up the fire with it. THE CAUSE OF ITS CURDLING. I say that the cause of this congealing often proceeds from too much fire, or from ill-dried wood. TO KNOW THE CONDITION OF THE FIRE. You may know when the fire is good and fit for your purpose by a clear flame, and if you see the tips of the flames dull and ending in much smoke do not trust it, and particularly when the flux metal is almost fluid. OF ALLOYING THE METAL. Metal for guns must invariably be made with 6 or even 8 per cent, that is 6 of tin to one hundred of copper, for the less you put in, the stronger will the gun be. WHEN THE TIN SHOULD BE ADDED TO THE COPPER. The tin should be put in with the copper when the copper is reduced to a fluid. HOW TO HASTEN THE MELTING. You can hasten the melting when 2/3ds of the copper is fluid; you can then, with a stick of chestnut-wood, repeatedly stir what of copper remains entire amidst what is melted. Introductory Observations on the Architectural Designs (XII), and Writings on Architecture (XIII). Until now very little has been known regarding Leonardo's labours in the domain of Architecture. No building is known to have been planned and executed by him, though by some contemporary writers incidental allusion is made to his occupying himself with architecture, and his famous letter to Lodovico il Moro,—which has long been a well-known document,—in which he offers his service as an architect to that prince, tends to confirm the belief that he was something more than an amateur of the art. This hypothesis has lately been confirmed by the publication of certain documents, preserved at Milan, showing that Leonardo was not only employed in preparing plans but that he took an active part, with much credit, as member of a commission on public buildings; his name remains linked with the history of the building of the Cathedral at Pavia and that of the Cathedral at Milan. Leonardo's writings on Architecture are dispersed among a large number of MSS., and it would be scarcely possible to master their contents without the opportunity of arranging, sorting and comparing the whole mass of materials, so as to have some comprehensive idea of the whole. The sketches, when isolated and considered by themselves, might appear to be of but little value; it is not till we understand their general purport, from comparing them with each other, that we can form any just estimate of their true worth. Leonardo seems to have had a project for writing a complete and separate treatise on Architecture, such as his predecessors and contemporaries had composed—Leon Battista Alberti, Filarete, Francesco di Giorgio and perhaps also Bramante. But, on the other hand, it cannot be denied that possibly no such scheme was connected with the isolated notes and researches, treating on special questions, which are given in this work; that he was merely working at problems in which, for some reason or other he took a special interest. A great number of important buildings were constructed in Lombardy during the period between 1472 and 1499, and among them there are several by unknown architects, of so high an artistic merit, that it is certainly not improbable that either Bramante or Leonardo da Vinci may have been, directly or indirectly, concerned in their erection. Having been engaged, for now nearly twenty years, in a thorough study of Bramante's life and labours, I have taken a particular interest in detecting the distinguishing marks of his style as compared with Leonardo's. In 1869 I made researches about the architectural drawings of the latter in the Codex Atlanticus at Milan, for the purpose of finding out, if possible the original plans and sketches of the churches of Santa Maria delle Grazie at Milan, and of the Cathedral at Pavia, which buildings have been supposed to be the work both of Bramante and of Leonardo. Since 1876 I have repeatedly examined Leonardo's architectural studies in the collection of his manuscripts in the Institut de France, and some of these I have already given to the public in my work on "Les Projets Primitifs pour la Basilique de St. Pierre de Rome", P1. 43. In 1879 I had the opportunity of examining the manuscript in the Palazzo Trivulzio at Milan, and in 1880 Dr Richter showed me in London the manuscripts in the possession of Lord Ashburnham, and those in the British Museum. I have thus had opportunities of seeing most of Leonardo's architectural drawings in the original, but of the manuscripts tliemselves I have deciphered only the notes which accompany the sketches. It is to Dr Richter's exertions that we owe the collected texts on Architecture which are now published, and while he has undertaken to be responsible for the correct reading of the original texts,