The towering genius of Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) has been celebrated—and remained undisputed—for hundreds of years. A groundbreaking, essential addition to scholarship,  Leonardo da Vinci Rediscovered continues this legacy while simultaneously reexamining the multifaceted artist’s life and work from the ground up. This authoritative, four-volume study marks the 500th anniversary of the great master’s death with a sweeping, up-to-date portrait of Leonardo as he has never been seen before.

Internationally renowned Leonardo specialist Carmen C. Bambach unfurls new narratives, largely based on the most important, yet most misunderstood, body of evidence available: the artist’s drawings, paintings, and manuscripts. In the manner of a biographer, Bambach combs through contemporary documents and more than 4,000 surviving sheets of Leonardo’s notes and drawings to extract details about his development as an artist and thinker that have never before been suggested. Some 1,500 illustrations portray the staggering, spectacular legacy that Leonardo left behind on paper and canvas. Through Bambach’s comprehensive research, Leonardo emerges as a figure who both embodies his era and completely transcends it, enduring as one of history’s greatest artists, scientists, and inventors.