Proof Silver Coin Leonardo da Vinci Lady with a hranostaj 2009

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Masters of Europe series

Exclusive silver (rectangular) coin issued by the Cook Islands in 2009 from the Masters of Europe series depicting a coloured painting of Leonardo da Vinci - Lady with a Brimstone on the reverse. The portrait on the coin includes a Swarovski crystal. The obverse is accompanied by the inscriptions 'OLD MASTERS OF EUROPE', 'LEONARDO DA VINCI' and the year '1452 - 1519'. The obverse shows a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II and the face value.

The coin comes in a blue gift box with grey and silver trim along with a certificate of authenticity in a limited edition of only 5000 pieces for the whole world!

Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (Lionardo in Tuscan) (15 April 1452 Anchiano u Vinci - 2 May 1519 Cloux u Amboise) was a versatile Renaissance figure. He was an important painter, sculptor, architect, naturalist, musician, writer, inventor and engineer.

He was the illegitimate son of the notary Piero and the peasant Catharina. He was born at 10.30 p.m. and baptised in the presence of ten godparents. His mother married a year later to a man named Accattabrigo, and his father had married the daughter of a Florentine notary four months earlier. The father acknowledged Leonardo as his own and provided him with a general education. No records of his childhood have survived, so we can only guess at his youth. All that is known of the young Leonardo is that he was of pleasing appearance and so strong that he could bend iron bars.

Leonardo was gifted in many different fields, from painting to sculpture, building, playing the lute and, last but not least, he was an excellent inventor. As a scientist, Leonardo da Vinci (1452 - 1519) took up the work of G.Galileo (1564 - 1642) F.Bacon (1561 - 1626) I.Newton (1643 - 1727) and others. He had the correct idea about the movement of planets, gravity, waves, combustion, blood circulation etc.As an inventor he foresaw or designed the principle of dredge, centrifuge, blower, earth drills, wheel boat, airplane, parachute, diving suit, rifled barrel, treadle lathe, printing press , screw and screw machine, weaving machine and many other machines. He drew many different sketches, plans or inventions that were not realized until the 19th or 20th century. Leonardo da Vinci left behind many unfinished paintings and inventions, and some have been lost over the centuries, research into Leonardo's diaries is still incomplete. 3,500 volumes of technical sketches and 48 volumes of manuscripts and notes, mostly encrypted, have survived.

Another probable story from his childhood is the incident of a piece of rough board given by a merchant to Leonardo's father to paint a heart on. Leonardo, however, rejected this triviality and supposedly embellished it with perfect depictions of the mythical monsters that everyone feared. Ser Piero then sold this painting to a Jew at a great profit, and gave the original purchaser a fairground drawing of a heart, which the poor man did not even notice[