Four laws of heavy bodies, with a winding-beam query
Laws of falling weights, a card cast through air, a roller-and-cord puzzle, and expense figures
Beneath long columns of expense figures Leonardo sets down four terse laws of heavy bodies: every weight seeks to make its centre common and gains weight and impetus as it descends; the gravity is the greater whose descent is the less oblique; every weight presses along the line of its motion; and the heaviest part of a body becomes its guide once motion begins. A small rectangle prompts the question of the path a card-like sheet takes when thrown down through the air, and a winding-beam (subbio) with a hanging weight is drawn to ask how high the weight rises as its cord rewinds. A note at lower right names Piero d'Antonio in Florence and partners in Bologna.
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Four laws of heavy bodies and impetus
Every weight desires that its centre become common, and the more it descends the greater weight and impetus it acquires; impetus without opposition prolongs the desire of the thing moved. The gravity is shown greater whose descent is less oblique; every weight presses along the line of its motion; and the heaviest part of a body becomes its guide once motion has begun.
Path of a card-like sheet thrown through the air
Beside a small rectangle Leonardo asks: if you throw this downward through the air, what will its path be, it being in the manner of a playing card? The query concerns how a flat, light sheet behaves as it falls.
Winding-beam (subbio) with weight and cord
A roller or winding-beam is drawn at the left with a hanging weight. Leonardo asks how high the weight will rise, once it has unwound the roller's cord, as the cord winds the opposite way over the beam by reason of the wheel's impetus.
Columns of expense figures by weekday
The upper sheet is filled with columns of figures tagged by day - Saturday, morning, Monday after Carnival, Wednesday morning - recording sums in a running domestic account.
Note of a Florentine correspondent
A line at lower right records Piero d'Antonio in Florence and partners in Bologna, apparently a business or banking contact.