235

disappearance.

An opaque body seen in a line in which the light falls will reveal no prominences to the eye. For instance, let a be the solid body and c the light; c m and c n will be the lines of incidence of the light, that is to say the lines which transmit the light to the object a. The eye being at the point b, I say that since the light c falls on the whole part m n the portions in relief on that side will all be illuminated. Hence the eye placed at c cannot see any light and shade and, not seeing it, every portion will appear of the same tone, therefore the relief in the prominent or rounded parts will not be visible.

Taken from The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci edited by Jean Paul Richter, 1880.

III * V
Notebooks of Leonoardo da Vinci
IV: Perspective of Disappearance.
. . .
Definition.
222,
223
An illustration by experiment.
224
A guiding rule.
225
An experiment.
226
On indistinctness at short distances.
227,
228,
229,
230,
231
On indistinctness at great distances.
232,
233,
234
disappearance.
235,
236,
237,
238,
239
objects.
240,
241,
242,
243,
244,
245,
246,
247,
248,
249
Propositions on perspective of disappearance from MS. C..
250,
251,
252,
253,
254,
255
. . .