Leonardo da Vinci was born in 1452, just forty years before the discovery of America by Columbus. He belongs to that wonderfully enthusiastic age — the Renaissance — that period of the rebirth, when after centuries of dormancy the souls of men awoke to the beauty and the wonder of the external world; when the inspiration of Greece broke the fetters of slavish imitation; when learning became so democratic that it demolished the strongholds of superstition. It was during this time that Leonardo, a boy between ten and fifteen, came to Florence to study art in the studio of Verrocchio
It was in such an age that Leonardo rose to be master in all things pertaining to art. He himself had been richly endowed by nature. Tall, graceful, with a face strong and faultless in contour, he moved about with the ease and dignity of a Greek god. Amiable and generous, he made friends of all classes; he loved and was loved even by the animals, which he loved to such an extent as to become a vegetarian rather than inflict death on any living creature.