Scrap of Leonardo's work found in Nantes library, but contents are a mystery while scholars decipher 15th century script

A long-lost fragment of manuscript by Renaissance genius Leonardo da Vinci has been uncovered in a public library in western France after lying forgotten in storage for nearly one and a half centuries.

The text, written from right to left in Leonardo's characteristic mirror-writing, was among 5,000 documents donated to the city of Nantes in 1872 by wealthy collector Pierre-Antoine Labouchère, and then left to languish in local archives.

It was only when a local journalist came across a reference to the document's location in a biography of the Italian master that the manuscript was tracked down.

Continue reading