ART AND CULTURE.
The scholar Carlo Vecce found an original document within the Florence Archives through which it may be possible to rewrite the story of Catherine, mother of Leonardo da Vinci.
According to the document found, the mother of Leonardo da Vinci would have been a young woman originally from ancient Circassia, a region of the Caucasus, who came to Florence as a slave and was later freed by a deed written by the notary Piero da Vinci, father of Leonardo, on November 2, 1452.
The discovery, and the story that was uncovered, was revealed by Carlo Vecce himself, who from that document prompted both his research and the publication of a book. The hypothesis that Leonardo's mother was a slave had long been known but no document had ever confirmed it.
The scholar Carlo Vecce, a professor at the University of Naples and a scholar of the Renaissance civilization, has found an original document within the Florence Archives through which it may be possible to rewrite the story of Catherine, mother of Leonardo da Vinci.
According to the document found, Leonardo da Vinci 's mother would have been a young woman originally from ancient Circassia, a region of the Caucasus, who came to Florence as a slave and was later freed by a deed written by the notary Piero da Vinci, Leonardo's father, on November 2, 1452.
The discovery, and the story that was uncovered, were revealed by Carlo Vecce himself, who from that document prompted both his research and the publication of a book. The hypothesis that Leonardo 's mother was a slave had been known for some time but no document had ever confirmed it.
As revealed by Carlo Vecce: " Leonardo 's mother was a girl from Circassia who at one point in her life was kidnapped and sold several times as a slave until she came from Constantinople to Venice and then to Florence where she met Leonardo da Vinci's father."
The remains of Catherine may also have been found.
Vecce finally revealed that recently in Milan, behind Sant'Ambrogio, in the works for the new headquarters of the University Cattolica, the chapel of the Immaculate Conception is reappearing, in whose crypt human remains of ancient burials have been found. Perhaps, speculates Vecce, even the remains of Catherine, who died in Milan in the arms of her son Leonardo in 1494, and was buried there. (in the photo the Florence State Archives the act of Caterina's liberation from slavery).