Leonardo da Vinci - Quiz
Leonardo da Vinci
  • 1. When was Leonardo da Vinci born?
A) March 22, 1433
B) August 10, 1520
C) April 15, 1452
D) June 15, 1478
  • 2. Which Italian ruler was a patron of Leonardo da Vinci?
A) Ludovico Sforza
B) Julius Caesar
C) Napoleon Bonaparte
D) Cleopatra
  • 3. What is Leonardo da Vinci's most famous portrait?
A) Girl with a Pearl Earring
B) The Starry Night
C) Mona Lisa
D) American Gothic
  • 4. What French king invited Leonardo da Vinci to live and work at the Château de Cloux?
A) Francis I
B) Philip II
C) Louis XIV
D) Henry VIII
  • 5. What did Leonardo da Vinci dissect to study human anatomy?
A) Corpses
B) Mannequins
C) Animals
D) Insects
  • 6. What was the name of Leonardo da Vinci's notebook filled with sketches and ideas?
A) Codex
B) Tome
C) Scroll
D) Tablet
  • 7. Who was the teacher who inspired and encouraged Leonardo da Vinci's artistic talents?
A) Andrea del Verrocchio
B) Rembrandt
C) Pablo Picasso
D) Vincent van Gogh
  • 8. What is the title of the mural painted by Leonardo da Vinci that depicts the dinner Jesus had with his disciples before his crucifixion?
A) The Sistine Chapel
B) The Birth of Venus
C) The Last Supper
D) The Creation of Adam
  • 9. What is Leonardo da Vinci's full name?
A) Leonardo Michelangelo di Vinci
B) Leonardo Raphael da Vinci
C) Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci
D) Leonardo Donatello di Vinci
  • 10. Where did Leonardo spend his last three years?
A) France
B) Milan
C) Florence
D) Rome
  • 11. What record did Salvator Mundi set in 2017?
A) Largest painting sold at auction
B) First painting by Leonardo sold at auction
C) Oldest painting sold at auction
D) Most expensive painting sold at public auction
  • 12. Which field did Leonardo make substantial discoveries in?
A) Anatomy
B) Chemistry
C) Philosophy
D) Astronomy
  • 13. What type of vehicle did Leonardo conceptualize?
A) Steam engine
B) Armoured fighting vehicle
C) Submarine
D) Hot air balloon
  • 14. Which invention by Leonardo entered manufacturing unheralded?
A) Automated bobbin winder
B) Ratio machine
C) Armoured fighting vehicle
D) Flying machine
  • 15. What is the approximate distance of Vinci from Florence?
A) 10 miles
B) 30 miles
C) 50 miles
D) 20 miles
  • 16. What was Leonardo's father's profession?
A) Painter
B) Merchant
C) Florentine legal notary
D) Artisan
  • 17. What nickname was given to Antonio di Piero Buti del Vacca?
A) 'The scholar'
B) 'The quarrelsome one'
C) 'The notary'
D) 'The painter'
  • 18. How many times did Ser Piero marry after Caterina?
A) Three
B) Four
C) Two
D) One
  • 19. How many half-siblings did Leonardo have who survived infancy?
A) 11
B) 16
C) 8
D) 5
  • 20. At what age was the last of Leonardo's half-siblings born?
A) 46 years old
B) 40 years old
C) 30 years old
D) 50 years old
  • 21. What type of education did Leonardo receive?
A) Basic and informal
B) Religious schooling
C) Military training
D) Advanced formal
  • 22. Which skills were included in Leonardo's basic education?
A) Latin, philosophy, and science
B) (Vernacular) writing, reading, and mathematics
C) Sculpture, painting, and music
D) Engineering, anatomy, and astronomy
  • 23. What is the name of Leonardo's earliest memory recorded in the Codex Atlanticus?
A) A kite came to his cradle and opened his mouth with its tail
B) Meeting his father
C) Flying a bird for the first time
D) Painting his first artwork
  • 24. Who recorded Leonardo's biography in 'Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'?
A) Leonardo da Vinci
B) Francesco da Vinci
C) Antonio da Vinci
D) Giorgio Vasari
  • 25. Where did Leonardo da Vinci become an apprentice around the age of 14?
A) Bargello
B) Verrocchio's workshop
C) Medici Palace
D) Platonic Academy
  • 26. Which artist's death coincided with Leonardo becoming a studio boy?
A) Piero della Francesca
B) Masaccio
C) Donatello
D) Ghiberti
  • 27. Who were Leonardo's contemporaries that he met at Verrocchio's workshop?
A) Michelangelo, Bramante, Titian
B) Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Perugino
C) Alberti, Piero della Francesca, Raphael
D) Donatello, Masaccio, Ghiberti
  • 28. Which artist's work was known for realism and emotion in frescoes?
A) Ghiberti
B) Leon Battista Alberti
C) Masaccio
D) Piero della Francesca
  • 29. What was the title of the painting Leonardo collaborated on with Verrocchio?
A) The Baptism of Christ
B) Tobias and the Angel
C) David
D) Madonna of the Rocks
  • 30. What technique did Leonardo apply to parts of 'The Baptism of Christ'?
A) Fresco
B) Oil paint
C) Tempera only
D) Watercolor
  • 31. What did Leonardo paint on a buckler shield that was sold for 100 ducats?
A) Vitruvian Man
B) The Last Supper
C) Mona Lisa
D) A monster spitting fire
  • 32. What was the form of the silver string instrument Leonardo brought to Milan?
A) A horse's head
B) An eagle's beak
C) A lion's mane
D) A dolphin's tail
  • 33. What was the name of the equestrian monument Leonardo planned for Ludovico Sforza?
A) Regisole
B) Gattamelata
C) Bartolomeo Colleoni
D) Gran Cavallo
  • 34. What was the trompe-l'œil decoration in the Sala delle Asse intended to resemble?
A) A forest of oak trees
B) A garden of roses
C) A pergola created by interwoven mulberry trees
D) A vineyard
  • 35. Where did Leonardo flee to after Ludovico Sforza was overthrown?
A) Milan
B) Rome
C) Florence
D) Venice
  • 36. Who was Leonardo in service to in Cesena in 1502?
A) Pope Alexander VI
B) Ludovico Sforza
C) Charles II d'Amboise
D) Cesare Borgia
  • 37. Which anatomical feature did Leonardo da Vinci make one of the first scientific drawings of in utero?
A) Foetus
B) Heart
C) Liver
D) Lungs
  • 38. Who assumed the papacy in March 1513?
A) Giuliano de' Medici
B) Pope Clement VII
C) Pope Julius II
D) Lorenzo de' Medici's son Giovanni as Leo X
  • 39. What was the total amount of Leonardo's pension in France?
A) 8,000 crowns
B) 15,000 florins
C) 5,000 ducats
D) 10,000 scudi
  • 40. Where did Leonardo da Vinci die?
A) Milan
B) Florence
C) Rome
D) Clos Lucé
  • 41. What was the height of the skeleton discovered by Houssaye?
A) 2.00 metres (6.6 ft)
B) 1.60 metres (5.3 ft)
C) 1.50 metres (4.9 ft)
D) 1.73 metres (5.7 ft)
  • 42. What nickname was given to Leonardo's assistant Salaì?
A) The Master's Shadow
B) Il Salaino
C) The Little Genius
D) The Pupil
  • 43. Who was Leonardo working on an equestrian monument for?
A) King Francis I of France
B) Pope Leo X
C) Lorenzo de' Medici
D) Gian Giacomo Trivulzio
  • 44. Which king of France supported Leonardo in his old age?
A) Charles IX
B) Francis I
C) Louis XII
D) Henry II
  • 45. Under whom did Leonardo da Vinci study mathematics in the 1490s?
A) Nicolas Poussin
B) Cardinal Louis d'Aragon
C) Marcantonio della Torre
D) Luca Pacioli
  • 46. What is 'sfumato', a technique used by Leonardo?
A) The subtle shadowing that creates a smoky effect
B) A way to create three-dimensional effects with lines
C) A style of painting with visible brushstrokes
D) A method of using bright, contrasting colors
  • 47. What was Leonardo da Vinci's painting technique for 'The Last Supper'?
A) Tempera over a ground that was mainly gesso
B) Encaustic wax painting
C) Oil on canvas
D) Fresco on wet plaster
  • 48. Who was King Francis I's royal advisor that sent instructions regarding Leonardo?
A) Lorenzo di Credi
B) Antonio Maria Pallavicini
C) Guillaume Gouffier, seigneur de Bonnivet
D) Francesco Melzi
  • 49. Who was Leonardo's favourite student?
A) Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio
B) Marco d'Oggiono
C) Bernardino Luini
D) Count Francesco Melzi
  • 50. What did Vasari say about the 'Mona Lisa's' smile?
A) 'So pleasing that it seems more divine than human'
B) 'It is a simple and unremarkable feature'
C) 'It lacks any emotional depth'
D) 'It is identical to the original model's smile'
  • 51. What was the subject of a project Leonardo may have commenced for Charles II d'Amboise?
A) A map
B) A mural
C) A portrait
D) An equestrian figure
  • 52. In what year did Leonardo first state the 'laws' of sliding friction in his notebooks?
A) 1520
B) 1493
C) 1505
D) 1512
  • 53. Who observed Leonardo at work on 'The Last Supper' and wrote about it?
A) Matteo Bandello
B) Michelangelo
C) Ludovico Sforza
D) Vasari
  • 54. Who made explicit his opinion that Leonardo's relations with Salaì were intimate and homosexual?
A) Vasari
B) Melzi
C) Sigmund Freud
D) Walter Isaacson
  • 55. Which artist's drawings were based on Leonardo's anatomical studies for publication?
A) Nicolas Poussin
B) Michelangelo
C) Raphael
D) Titian
  • 56. Which river's flow did Leonardo devise a scheme to divert in 1502?
A) Arno
B) Tiber
C) Adige
D) Po
  • 57. What was one of the projects Leonardo worked on for Pope Leo X regarding the Pontine Marshes?
A) Creating a botanical garden
B) Building a new church
C) Designing a fountain
D) Plans for draining them
  • 58. What did Leonardo decorate with scales dipped in quicksilver?
A) A painting
B) A lizard
C) A statue
D) A manuscript
  • 59. What did Leonardo make notes on while dissecting cadavers in the Vatican Gardens?
A) Botanical studies
B) Anatomy of the human body
C) A treatise on vocal cords
D) Engineering designs
  • 60. What was found on one finger of the skeleton discovered by Arsène Houssaye?
A) A bronze ring
B) A gold necklace
C) An iron nail
D) A silver bracelet
  • 61. Which pupil of Leonardo is considered to have artistic merit comparable to others like Marco d'Oggiono?
A) Melzi
B) Boltraffio
C) Luca Pacioli
D) Salaì
  • 62. Which painting by Leonardo da Vinci is characterized by the Virgin Mary sitting or kneeling to the right, approached by an angel?
A) Saint Jerome in the Wilderness
B) Mona Lisa
C) Virgin of the Rocks
D) Annunciations
  • 63. Where did Leonardo live from September 1513 to 1516?
A) Porta Orientale, Milan
B) At Medici's Vaprio d'Adda villa
C) In the Belvedere Courtyard in the Apostolic Palace, Rome
D) Clos Lucé near Château d'Amboise
  • 64. What event led to the demolition of the church where Leonardo was buried?
A) An earthquake in 1802
B) The French Revolution
C) World War I
D) The Black Plague
  • 65. Which drawing technique did Leonardo use in 'The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and Saint John the Baptist'?
A) Chiaroscuro
B) Grisaille
C) Sfumato
D) Impasto
  • 66. What did Leonardo identify as defining the circulatory system?
A) The heart
B) The liver
C) The lungs
D) The brain
  • 67. Who owns the Codex Leicester?
A) John Nicholas Brown I
B) The British Library
C) Bill Gates
D) Robert Lehman
  • 68. Which book did Leonardo collaborate on with mathematician Luca Pacioli?
A) The Last Supper
B) Vitruvian Man
C) Divina proportione
D) Mona Lisa
  • 69. What was Leonardo given as a monthly allowance in Rome?
A) 50 scudi
B) 20 florins
C) 33 ducats
D) 40 crowns
  • 70. Which flying machine did Leonardo design that mimics bird flight?
A) Glider
B) Hot air balloon
C) Helicopter
D) Flapping ornithopter
  • 71. Which Renaissance movement recognized no polarities between the sciences and the arts?
A) The Enlightenment
B) Romanticism
C) Baroque period
D) Renaissance humanism
  • 72. Which painting by Leonardo da Vinci is characterized by a calm young woman accepting her role as the Mother of God with confidence?
A) The larger Annunciation
B) Saint Jerome in the Wilderness
C) Lady with an Ermine
D) Mona Lisa
  • 73. Who also worked on the project to divert the Arno river's flow alongside Leonardo?
A) Pope Leo X
B) Niccolò Machiavelli
C) Ludovico il Moro
D) Michelangelo
  • 74. Who discovered a partially complete skeleton believed to be Leonardo's remains?
A) Mary Margaret Heaton
B) Napoleon III
C) Charles Nicholl
D) Arsène Houssaye
  • 75. Who collaborated with Leonardo in his anatomical studies from 1510 to 1511?
A) Marcantonio della Torre
B) Nicolas Poussin
C) Verrocchio
D) Luca Pacioli
  • 76. In which year did Leonardo write to Ludovico il Moro about creating machines for city protection?
A) 1502
B) 1482
C) 1510
D) 1499
  • 77. Which of the following did Leonardo not study anatomically?
A) Insects
B) Bears
C) Cows
D) Monkeys
  • 78. How was the painting referred to as Joconda valued in Salaì's posthumous inventory?
A) 505 lire
B) 750 lire
C) 1000 lire
D) 300 lire
  • 79. In what year was Leonardo charged with sodomy, and how old was he at the time?
A) 1503, aged fifty-two
B) 1492, aged forty-one
C) 1485, aged thirty-three
D) 1476, aged twenty-four
  • 80. What technique did Leonardo perfect that represents internal components in technical drawings?
A) Orthographic projection
B) Isometric view
C) Exploded view
D) Perspective view
  • 81. What did Leonardo create that walked towards the King during a pageant?
A) A painting of Francis I
B) A mechanical lion
C) A portrait of Louise of Savoy
D) An equestrian statue
  • 82. On what date did Leonardo da Vinci pass away?
A) June 23, 1524
B) April 15, 1506
C) May 2, 1519
D) March 30, 1498
  • 83. When did Leonardo return to Florence after leaving Borgia's service?
A) Early 1503
B) Early 1506
C) Late 1504
D) Mid-1505
  • 84. Where was Leonardo sorting out a dispute in 1507?
A) Rome
B) Milan
C) Venice
D) Florence
  • 85. Which television series built ten machines designed by Leonardo?
A) Masters of Invention
B) The Art of Engineering
C) Doing DaVinci
D) Leonardo's Dream Machines
  • 86. Which of Leonardo's works is noted for its androgyny and eroticism?
A) Saint John the Baptist
B) The Last Supper
C) Vitruvian Man
D) Mona Lisa
  • 87. What year were documents published revealing Houssaye's actions?
A) 2019
B) 1987
C) 1999
D) 2005
  • 88. Who summoned Leonardo to Milan in 1506?
A) Ludovico Sforza
B) Charles II d'Amboise
C) Pope Alexander VI
D) Cesare Borgia
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