Scholars generally state that Leonardo da Vinci died in 1519 at age 67 of recurrent stroke. One finding may confirm this medical hypothesis: in 1863, the grave of Leonardo was discovered in the Saint-Florentin chapel of Amboise (France), with the skeleton of an old man, tiny fragments of white hair, 8 remaining teeth, and the upper right arm blocked over the skull1 (figure).
Engraving from L'Artiste (Paris), March 1, 1864, from a drawing by Frans Verhas.
The main explication for this atypical position is the presence of a local or regional handicap. Stroke is a possible cause of such anomaly, causing muscular retraction or shoulder dislocation (whose reduction may be difficult or impossible, even postmortem).2 A direct examination of the skeleton could complete this anthropologic analysis.
Footnotes
Author contributions: Dr. Charlier: study supervision, main writing process, analysis and interpretation. S. Deo: critical revision of the manuscript for important intellectual content.
Study funding: No targeted funding reported.
Disclosure: The authors report no disclosures relevant to the manuscript. Go to Neurology.org for full disclosures.
- © 2017 American Academy of Neurology
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