Not long ago, Leonardo da Vinci's sketches for a mechanical knight became known.

The robot knight could sit down, rotate his arms, move his head, open and close his jaw.

The robot was designed to be able to hold something in its hands. The operation of the arms was to be controlled by a mechanical programmable device in the chest. The legs had to be controlled by a crank that moved a cable connected to the legs.

36 years after the sketches were created, the idea of ​​​​a robot knight mechanism was used as the basis for a self-propelled mechanical lion, which was created at the request of the Medici. When Francis1 ascended the throne in front of him, the king of France, there was a lion that was able to move from its place. Michelangelo Buanorotti, in a booklet published in Florence in 1600, also mentions this automaton - a mechanical lion that walked several steps. Unfortunately, Leonardo da Vinci's robotic lion has not survived

These automata were the predecessors of mobile robots.

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Shield of the Gorgon Medusa

One day, a peasant he knew asked Father Leonardo to find an artist to paint a round wooden shield. Ser Pierrot gave the shield to his son. Leonardo decided to depict the head of the gorgon Medusa, and in order for the image of the monster to make the right impression on the audience, he used lizards, snakes, grasshoppers, caterpillars, bats and “other creatures” as subjects, “from a variety of which, combining them in different ways, he created the monster very disgusting and terrible, which poisoned with its breath and ignited the air.”

The result exceeded his expectations: when Leonardo showed the finished work to his father, he was scared. The son told him: “This work serves the purpose for which it was made. So take it and give it away, for this is the effect that is expected from works of art.” Ser Piero did not give Leonardo's work to the peasant: he received another shield, bought from a junk dealer. Father Leonardo sold the shield of Medusa in Florence, receiving one hundred ducats for it. According to legend, this shield passed to the Medici family, and when it was lost, the sovereign owners of Florence were expelled from the city by the rebellious people.

* Gorgons in ancient greek mythology- these are snake-haired monsters, daughters of the sea deity. One of them, the gorgon Medusa, could captivate people with her gaze; Medusa’s gaze turned all living things to stone.

Leonardo's passion

Leonardo's hobbies even included cooking and the art of serving. In Milan, for 13 years he was the manager of court feasts. He invented several culinary devices to make the work of cooks easier. Leonardo's original dish - thinly sliced ​​stewed meat with vegetables placed on top - was very popular at court feasts.

Leonardo's handwriting

Leonardo was equally good with his right and left hands. They even say that he could write different texts with different hands at the same time. However, he wrote most of his works with his left hand from right to left. Some believe that his mirror handwriting was individual feature Leonardo, i.e. It was easier for him to write this way than in the normal way.

Modern robots are already far from their predecessors, and it is impossible to recognize the history of the first mechanized devices in them. Nevertheless, these were very interesting automata and robots that used the most unpredictable principles and mechanisms in their work. Among them there is even an artificial duck! Learn about seven original devices of former times, some of which are still in effect now, and some have been lost and are stored only in memory and literary evidence.

Knight Leonardo da Vinci

The great painter and inventor Leonardo developed many unique devices. His creations even included a hydraulic clock and a robotic lion. The most outstanding of all was an artificial man in the form of an armed Germanic knight. It was assumed that it would be moved by a mechanism with cables, with the help of which the robot would move its head, bend its arms and raise its visor. Not a single complete draft of the machine's circuit diagram has survived to this day, but evidence confirms that Da Vinci actually built such a knight in 1495. In 2002, robot specialist Mark Rosheim tried to restore the device from scraps of notes. The device turned out to be working, which allows us to consider Leonardo da Vinci a pioneer of robotics. Not all of his inventions were successful, but this one really works and can impress anyone who is interested in robots and all kinds of mechanisms - it can compete with many modern devices of a similar nature.

Mechanical Monk

The mechanical monk, which appeared in the sixteenth century, was the result of a kept promise by King Philip II. His son was suffering from a head injury, and the king vowed that he would create a miracle if the boy recovered. When health truly returned, King Philip II ordered a figure of the Franciscan monk Diego de Alcala from a watchmaker. By 1560 it was finished. The figurine was controlled by a tensioned cable with various weights and levels, as well as three small wheels hidden under the monastic robe. The monk could move his legs to create the appearance of walking, and also moved his eyes, lips and nodded his head. The figurine plausibly created the impression of a praying person. The device still works and is on display at the Smithsonian Mechanical Museum in Washington.

Al-Jazari Flying Band

The Arab mathematician Al-Jazari created unique mechanical figurines at the end of the twelfth century. He created a robot that could pour wine, a clock controlled by water, and a hand-washing mechanism that dispensed soap and towels on its own. The crown jewel of the collection was an automatic orchestra that could float on water and play music as it moved. It included four instruments - a harp, a flute and two drums. In addition, the orchestra housed mechanical rowers who would move the device across the lake. The mechanism was based on a rotating drum that moved cables, resulting in the creation of different sounds. Special elements made the musicians and rowers move realistically. By changing the drum, it was possible to change the melody being played. It turns out that Al-Jazari's orchestra was one of the first programmable computers in history. Unfortunately, not a single figure has survived to this day; the drawings and diagrams have disappeared. It remains impossible to reproduce the device or find out the exact principle of its operation to this day - the greatest invention of Muslim culture exists only in literary works.

Dove of Archytas

Archytas was a famous mathematician and politician. According to some sources, he could also be the founder of robotics. 350 BC, he invented a wooden dove that moved under the influence of steam. He could flap his wings and fly into the air. Schemes and prototypes have not survived to this day, so modern scientists can only guess how the device worked. Some believe that the pigeon moved on a rope, under the influence of compressed air placed inside. Be that as it may, the ancient device still impresses the imagination - it is one of the first robots in history. There were no attempts to reproduce the device.

Silver Swan

An amazing device that still works today was created in 1773. Using a complex system of clockwork mechanisms, the bird-shaped robot can move like a real swan swimming through a stormy stream. The bird bends its neck and opens its beak with impressive realism, and many small mechanisms throughout the body create the illusion of water moving on its sides with fish moving in it, which the swan seems to catch and eat. Inside there is a music box that accompanies the performance with sounds.

Robots by Jacques Droz

Swiss inventor Pierre Jacques Droz became famous as the creator of luxury watches, but besides them, he also created three unique mechanical figures. The first was a doll created in 1768. It was a figurine in the form of a boy sitting at a desk. Using a complex system of thousands of moving parts, the robot could dip a pen into ink and write up to forty letters on a piece of paper, which were programmed in advance. Then two more dolls were created that operated on a similar principle - the artist’s doll could draw a portrait of King Louis the Fifteenth, and the musician performed five different songs on a miniature organ. Each robot had an expressive face with eyes that moved in response to the doll's actions. The music-playing doll could even breathe and bow. Droz's robots amazed courtiers until the end of the eighteenth century, and then were transferred to the museum, where they are still kept. Surprisingly, they still work.

Vacançon's duck

In 1730, French inventor Jacques Waccanson captivated audiences with several incredible robots. He created a mechanical flutist who used artificial lungs to perform a repertoire of twelve songs. Then a robot was created that played the trumpet and drum. He performed melodies faster than any living person. Vacanson's masterpiece - a mechanical duck - appeared in 1739. This bird could flap its wings, splash in a pool of water and eat grain from the hands of spectators. She “digested” the grains and defecated in compressed lumps on a silver plate. The amazing mechanism worked with the help of many parts and elements. A flexible rubber tube served as the intestine, which provided the main focus - eating and digesting food. The duck made its creator so famous that he represented it royal families throughout Europe. Vacanson was respected by Voltaire himself, who compared the inventor to Prometheus and noted that Vacanson's duck represented the glory of France.

The Leonardo Robot is a humanoid machine whose technology was developed by Leonardo da Vinci around 1495.

Blueprints for the robot were found in Leonardo's papers discovered in the 1950s. It is unknown whether the development was carried out.

The robot's frame was covered with German-Italian knight's armor, it was programmed to imitate human movements (rise and sit, move its arms and neck) and had an anatomically correct jaw structure. The technology was based in part on Leonardo's research in anatomy, in particular.

Several years ago, mechanic Gabriel Nicolai, head of the TeknoArt studio, decided to restore a ceremonial robot created by da Vinci for the Duke of Florence. The robot had to act without any human assistance.

The structure was driven by a propeller driven by wind or water flow. Due to the limitations imposed by the energy source, the robot could move, but could not move in space.

The device of the mechanical knight was contained in two dozen drawings and notes by Leonardo da Vinci. Having assembled the robot, Nikolai realized that it did not work. At first, the engineer decided that da Vinci simply failed to create a working design. However, he soon discovered that the artist had encrypted the correct design by adding drawings of extra or non-functioning components.

Leonardo da Vinci was an expert in human anatomy and personally performed more than 30 autopsies. He created his robot in the image and likeness of a person. While looking through the artist's papers, Nikolai discovered a drawing of a cylinder. As it turns out, he is the heart of the robot and sets the required rhythm for the entire mechanism.

The knight is currently on display at an exhibition in Sydney. Leonardo da Vinci, in addition to paintings, left behind many drawings, notes and documents. Last year, French mechanics managed to restore a mechanical lion created by the artist for the King of France in 1515.

Another of Leonardo's inventions was recently presented to the general public. In France, modern master Renato Boaretto invented a mechanical lion based on partially remaining drawings from the time of Leonardo. A lion made of wood and papier-mâché strolls leisurely, looking around, opening its mouth and raising and lowering its tail. But if you stroke his mane, a door opens in his side, from which several lilies jump out. The lion is life-size and is wound with a key, like an antique watch or a children's wind-up toy. But this plant, unfortunately, is enough for him to take 10 steps.

The mechanical lion was originally invented upon the accession of Francis I to the throne. In front of him, the king of France, was a lion who was able to move from his place and open his chest from which lilies peeked out. Unfortunately, Leonardo da Vinci's robotic lion has not survived.
Now, the lion, recreated with all care, has become part of the exhibition, which can also be admired by ordinary citizens visiting the museum on the site of the last home of the great Leonardo, in the castle of Clos-Lucé.

Sources

Around 1596, Leonardo da Vinci designed (and possibly assembled and tested) a mechanical knight clad in armor, apparently the first anthropomorphic robot.

Inside the armor was a mechanism that moved an artificial person using cables and rollers, creating the illusion that there was a living person inside. The robot knight could sit up, move his head and arms, and open and close his mouth anatomically correctly. Also, he could imitate sounds - he walked to the accompaniment of automatic drums.

The artist's drawings indicate that all parts of the device had sufficient coordination: control over them was carried out by a mechanical control device programmable by direct coding and located in the robot's chest, and the legs were driven separately, by means of an external handle pulling a cable connected to the most important links in the ankle, knee, hip.

Robot Knight Control Arm

Da Vinci's Robot Knight "dressed" in armor typical of Germany and Italy at the end of the 15th century. It is important to note that during the Middle Ages there were only a few inventors who created such structures for the entertainment of royal families.

In 2005, members of the Department of Biochemical Engineering at the University of Connecticut began recreating Da Vinci's Robot Knight. The project will be carried out using computer technology: the robot will contain electronic filling, have a more developed body structure and voice control.

Da Vinci robot model
Photo from the official website of the University of Connecticut

The robot will have a rotating neck to turn its head towards a moving object. Leonardo da Vinci's Android will be controlled using two command systems: one responds to voice, the other to computer commands. Gears and pulleys will be combined with a muscle model that mimics natural human movements.

Da Vinci is most often mentioned when it comes to painting, but among his many works were amazing inventions, one of which was a humanoid robot.

Leonardo knew mechanics, anatomy, and the properties of various materials very well. Often the master created something that his contemporaries did not understand, and only centuries later scientists were amazed when they found his drawings. The genius carefully encrypted his notes, which only added problems to the researchers, and some of his notes disappeared forever. Therefore, every find, every successful attempt at deciphering, every model that has been recreated becomes a sensation.

A little about the master

The future artist, sculptor, architect, writer, scientist and engineer was born in 1452 near the Florentine town of Vinci.

He was the illegitimate son of the notary Pierrot and a peasant girl. He did not have a surname: “da Vinci” is an addition to the name, it translates as “from Vinci” and indicates his place of birth. Leonardo studied in Florence with the artist Andrea del Verrocchio.

In addition to humanitarian and artistic disciplines, he studied chemistry, modeling, metallurgy, drawing, and worked with plaster, leather and metal. At the age of 20 he joined the Guild of St. Luke and received the status of master. Already during his apprenticeship, the talented apprentice mastered painting techniques better than his mentor. Da Vinci worked on paintings, sculptures and frescoes, and carried out orders from wealthy people.

At the same time I studied the structure human body, dissected corpses and carefully sketched the organs, skeleton and muscles, often from several angles. His approach was subsequently used in the compilation of anatomical atlases. Leonardo conducted experiments in the field of hydraulics and pneumatics, using the power of water and air to set machines in motion. He developed components and entire mechanisms, some of which were intended for combat operations.

Nothing seemed too insignificant to the genius; he owned a huge number of inventions in different areas of life, from cooking to aeronautics. Even the entertainment of a spectacle-hungry public was worthy of inventing something special: Leonardo da Vinci created the famous robot precisely for this purpose.

Some of Leonardo's inventions

Da Vinci improved his painting technique; his paintings look much more realistic than those of his predecessors. He realized that light was scattered in the air between the object and the observer, as a result of which the outlines of objects lost their clarity. Leonardo was able to convey this in his paintings and substantiated the phenomenon in theory. The technique is called “sfumato”, translated from Italian as “disappearing like smoke.” Other artists quickly appreciated the new technique and adopted it.

Observation, interest in anatomy, as well as the study of the works of the architect and scientist Vitruvius, who lived in the Roman Empire in the 1st century BC, led to the creation of the Vitruvian Man drawing. This illustration is annotated to explain the basic mathematical proportions of the body. Leonardo's engineering thinking bore fruit.

His inventions were ahead of their time, they still amaze the imagination, because models that are built according to five-century-old drawings work perfectly.

Models by Leonardo da Vinci

• The wooden cart, which moves itself, is driven by springs and also has a brake. Such a Renaissance car was successfully launched at the beginning of the 21st century.
• Da Vinci's parachute, made of wood and canvas, softly landed the tester, who risked jumping from a height of three thousand meters.
• The aircraft, which resembles an airplane, according to experts, will not be able to take off, although the persistence with which the master tried to lift the man into the air is respectable.
• Da Vinci's military developments are no less interesting. The tank - a closed chariot with weapons - was supposed to protect the infantry and inflict as much damage as possible on the enemy. Eight people were required to operate this unit.
• Bridges that could be easily moved and installed were certainly of interest to the generals of the time. A huge catapult with a screw collar was supposed to shoot stones.

These devices remained on paper; the fate of the wheel lock, which was actively used in firearms of the 15th-17th centuries, turned out to be different.

From 1516, Leonardo lived in France, where Francis I invited him, and was in charge of organizing court celebrations. Therefore, some of the inventions were needed to entertain the monarch and his entourage. Da Vinci had an excellent opportunity to continue his research, design mechanisms, test them in action, demonstrate them to spectators and receive a worthy reward for his work.

He drew up diagrams and descriptions, using a code and deliberately adding unnecessary elements to the drawings, probably so that the ideas could not be stolen and implemented by someone else. Leonardo da Vinci's robot knight, who was discovered in the mid-20th century, was no exception.

Sheets with drawings of an artificial person were found in 1957 by Carlo Pedretti. The recordings themselves were made in 1495 or 1496, but there is no reliable information about whether anyone saw Leonardo's robot in action. Mark Rosheim, an American robotics engineer, began studying the circuit in 1996, and in 2002 he succeeded and demonstrated an android that had been forgotten for five centuries. Another researcher, Mario Taddei, carried out another reconstruction, which turned out to be closer to the original design. The mechanism is working, all its parts function as expected.

Da Vinci knew well how human muscles, tendons and joints are structured, he understood the mechanics of the movements of living beings. When building Leonardo's robot, all the proportions that are known from the Vitruvian Man were observed. To prevent an android from falling, its center of gravity should always be located above its feet, and its shoulders, hips and ankles should lie in the same plane. Wooden joints, wire tendons and a steel skeleton are hidden under the German-Italian armor of the Middle Ages.

Da Vinci Robot Knight

The mechanical creature can turn its head, open and close its mouth, move its arms, sit down and stand up. The movements are very believable, and all this is the result of a system of rollers and cables. There is a control device in the android's chest; it is mechanical and uses the principle of direct coding. The upper and lower halves of the device are controlled separately: the nodes in the ankles, knees and hips can be controlled using the external handle.

Da Vinci's robot knight is capable of holding anything in its hands, so it is possible that it was designed for some kind of ceremonies or entertainment. In order for the car to move for some time without the participation of people, Leonardo could use water wheels or a crank mechanism. The principles of constructing this model formed the basis for another development - a mechanical lion for Francis I.

The machines that Da Vinci invented are in the eyes modern people look naive and uncomplicated. But their simplicity is brilliant, and the appearance of later analogues confirms that Leonardo was thinking in the right direction. Robotics in the 21st century draws inspiration from his work. Scientists want to create the same robot, but add electronics and the necessary programs. The new incarnation must carry out voice and computer commands. The ancient android was understood and accepted, even after hundreds of years.

7 Scientific Inventions of Leonardo da Vinci