In 1516, Leonardo da Vinci set off from Rome with a few assistants and traveled for over 1500 km to Amboise in northern France. Leonardo had been invited to France by King Francis 1 and offered a generous pension and lavish accommodation at the Chateau Clos Luce in Amboise. Leonardo would end up spending the last 2 years of his life at the Chateau Clos Luce and with 2019 being the 500th anniversary of his death, I figured it would be as good a time as any to visit Amboise while making my way back to Normandy to get the ferry back to Ireland.
Day 59 Wednesday August 21st – Total distance cycled from Chambord to Amboise – 75 km (900m of climbing). Total distance cycled so far on 2019 Tour de Travoy – 5200 km.
Chambord is the most visited chateau in France after the Palace of Versailles and it is easy to see why it attracts so many tourists. Completed in 1547 after almost 30 years work, it normally attracts over a million visitors every year. The château features 440 rooms, 282 fireplaces, and 84 staircases. The Chateau de Chambord was commisioned by the King of France, Francis 1 and it is claimed the original plans were drawn up by Leonardo da Vinci who was based at that time in Amboise, only 50 km from Chambord. However, Leonardo died in 1519, the same year construction started on the chateau. Responsibilty for the chateau’s plans passed to another Italian architect called Domenico da Cortona, though it is thought that some of Leonardo’s designs were incorporated into the final design. At times, over 1800 craftsmen worked on the chateau and it would take until 1547 for the chateau to be completed. The total cost of the chateau was almost half a million livres, the equivalent of €250 million nowadays.
I was extremely lucky to come across a flotilla of riverboats on the Loire river near Chaumont. In days gone by, small boats like these were used to ferry supplies up and down the river Loire. It was on riverboats similar to these that Leonardo and his entourage may have made their way from Roanne to Amboise in 1516.
The Royal Chateau in Amboise is located on a hill overlooking both the town centre and the Loire river. It mostly dates from the 15th Century and an underground tunnel links it to Chateau Clos Luce roughly 1 km away. King Francis 1 and his court were based here in October 1516 so Leonardo would have met the French king here for the first time since their only other previous meeting at Bologna in Italy in December 1515.
The Chateau de Clos Luce in Amboise was where Leonardo da Vinci resided for two and a half years between October 1516 until his death in May 1519. With this year being the 500th anniversary of his passing, it was as good a year as any to visit his final residence.
Among the many items Leonardo da Vinci took with him from Rome to Amboise was an unfinished painting called the Mona Lisa. He would complete that painting here at Clos Luce two years later in 1518.
The Mona Lisa was later purchased by King Francis 1, who hung it in his palace at Fontainebleau. King Louis XIV later moved it to the Palace of Versailles but in 1797, it was moved to the Louvre Museum in Paris where it has remained to this day. Before Covid-19, over 9 million people visited the Louvre every year and one director estimated 80% of people were there to only see the Mona Lisa.
While Leonardo completed a number of other paintings at Clos Luce in addition to the Mona Lisa, much of his time here was spent drawing up plans for a new palace for King Francis to be built at Romarantin, about 50 km from Amboise. This chateau was never built due to flooding but it is thought that some of Leonardo’s designs were incorporated into the Chateau de Chambord, that started being built in 1519 the same year that Leonardo da Vinci died.
With 2019 being the 500th anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci’s death, there was understandably considerable interest in Leonardo’s life and legacy in Amboise. Although he only lived for a few years in France, Leonardo is revered throughout the country partly because he chose to work for a French king at a time when France and Italy were often at war. He is also credited with bringing the Renaissance to France and he was followed by numerous other Italian craftsmen and designers. But whereas Leonardo made thousands of sketches and drawings throughout his life, he did not keep any journals. This has made it very difficult for historians to trace the motivation for many of his designs and the reasons for many of the projects Leonardo embarked on. In particular, historians can only speculate why Leonardo at the age of 64 decided to up sticks and travel almost 2000 km from Italy to France. Incredibly, for someone who was one of the most famous celebrities in the world at that time, there is no record of the route taken by him during his epic journey from Rome to Amboise in 1516. However, in recent years, a number of historians have been able to piece together the route he may have taken from clues in letters by contemporaries that have survived to this day. Seeing as I was just after traveling from Rome to Amboise as well, I was particularly interested in the exact route Leonardo may have used to get to Amboise. But as the way Leonardo went was totally different to the route I used, I have decided to write a separate article detailing Leonardo’s epic journey.
Tour de Travoy 