Research finds Leonardo da Vinci was Jewish

Italian historian Carlo Vecce set out to debunk rumours of da Vinci’s foreign origins, but a newly discovered document changed his mind.

In all likelihood, Leonardo da Vinci was only half Italian. His mother, Caterina, was a Circassian Jew born somewhere in the Caucasus, abducted as a teenager and sold as a sex slave several times in Russia, Constantinople and Venice before being freed in Florence at age 15.

This, at least, is the conclusion reached in the new book Il sorriso di Caterina, la madre di Leonardo, by the historian Carlo Vecce, one of the most distinguished specialists on  da Vinci.

The official version of da Vinci’s birth is that it was the fruit of a brief fling between the Florentine solicitor Piero da Vinci and a young peasant from Tuscany called Caterina, of whom almost nothing was known. Yet there had long been a seemingly unfounded theory that Leonardo had foreign origins and that Caterina was an Arab slave.

Six years ago, Professor Vecce decided to kill the rumour for good. “I simply found it impossible to believe that the mother of the greatest Italian genius would be a non-Italian slave,” he said. “Now, not only do I believe it, but the most probable hypothesis, given what I found, is that Caterina was Jewish.”

Vecce embarked on the research for his latest book during the reconstruction of da Vinci’s library, which is where he found the document that changed everything. Dated November 2, 1452, seven months after Leonardo’s birth, and signed by Piero da Vinci in his professional capacity, it is an emancipation act regarding “the daughter of a certain Jacob, originating from the Caucasian mountains,” and named Caterina.

According to the document, Catarina’s owner appears to have been the wife of rich merchant Donato di Filippo, who lived near the San Michele Visdomini church in Florence, and whose usual solicitor for business was Piero da Vinci.

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Leonardo da Vinci was Jewish (Tablet)

Image: Lucan portrait of Leonardo da Vinci