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Since its 2003 publication, "The Da Vinci Code" has caused quite a stir. Since its debut to glowing reviews, it has sold more than 40 million copies in at least 44 languages [ref]. In addition to being a bestseller, it's sparked a lot of controversy. It's a work of fiction, but it presents itself as based in fact, and many critics have raised questions about whether those facts are accurate. It's no secret that the HowStuffWorks staff likes to take things apart and see what makes them tick. Some of us are also the kind of sticklers who point out...

Leonardo da Vinci's The Virgin of the Rocks (about 1491/2-9 and 1506-8) originally had a very different composition, new research by the National Gallery in London revealed. Analysis of the artwork showed that two distinct drawings depicting the same figures in different poses lie beneath the painting, which is one of the most popular in the museum's collection. In the first composition, the angel holds the infant Christ much more tightly, and both figures are positioned higher. The Virgin also looks toward the pair, instead of staring downward. A second composition aligns much more closely to the final version, but...

It is the discovery of three almost invisible drawings on the back of Leonardo da Vinci's Virgin and Child With Saint Anne in the Louvre museum in Paris that has the French art world screaming "Sacre bleu!" Reminiscent of Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code, the mysterious sketches were found by experts looking into restoring the sixteenth-century masterpiece. They were detected when a curator noticed that some of the gray marks behind Virgin and Child With Saint Anne resembled a horse's head. An infrared photo confirmed his suspicion and revealed two other sketches: a human skull and the infant Jesus with...

<p>A new storm is brewing in the world of Da Vinci theorists after a mysterious group claimed it has used mirrors to uncover hidden biblical images in some of the great master’s most famous works.</p> <p>The Mirror of the Sacred Scriptures and Paintings In recent years, art history scholars have unveiled Templar knights, Mary Magdalene, a child and a musical script hidden in the Italian’s paintings.</p>

Researchers have discovered the hidden laboratory used by Leonardo da Vinci for studies of flight and other pioneering scientific work in previously sealed rooms at a monastery next to the Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata, in the heart of Florence. The workshop rooms, located between the Institute for Military Geography and the Basilica, contain frescos painted by Leonardo that have "impressive resemblances" to other examples of his experimental work. The frescos include a triptych of birds circling above a subsequently erased representation of the Virgin Mary that "constitutes a clear citation of the studies by the maestro on the flight...