Leonardo da Vinci was born in 1452, the illegitimate son of a Florentine notary, Ser Piero da Vinci, and an unmarried Tuscan peasant girl, Caterina. Raised by his father's grandparents and an uncle in the small countryside village of Vinci, the younger da Vinci moved to Florence at the age of 14 or 15 to pursue an apprenticeship and a career. As an illegitimate child, da Vinci was barred from pursuing an education at university, and from following in his father's footsteps as a notary or any position of similar stature in Florentine society (known as "the noble professions"). The only professions open to him were manual arts, such as military service, the arts, or literature. His father apprenticed him to local artist Andrea del Verrocchio, under whose tutelage he learned drawing, sculpting, engineering, and architecture techniques. After being accepted into the painters' guild in 1472 at age 20, da Vinci continued to...