Plans for a Prince's Palace, with Fire-Safe Construction
Ground-floor halls, vaulted mezzanines, ventilated privies, stables, a moat, and naval jousts
The sheet is covered with plans and notes for a princely palace, drawn as sketches and a large ground-plan divided into compartments. Leonardo prescribes a piazza before the palace, dancing and assembly halls on the ground floor (having seen upper floors collapse and kill people), fire-safe mezzanines of thin brick without timber, vaulted and reinforced with oak ties enclosed in the walls, and privies vented through the wall thickness with self-closing counterweighted doors. The plan labels stables, servants' quarters, kitchens and pantry, gives dimensions in braccia with a moat, and notes a 'road of Amboise' and jousts staged on ships across a rectangular lake. A closing note fixes the proportional division of the front so that the courtyard is half its width.
On this page
A prince's palace with a piazza and ground-floor halls
Leonardo directs that the prince's palace have a piazza in front, and that rooms meant for dancing, leaping or crowded gatherings be on the ground floor, since he has seen such halls collapse with the death of many. Every wall, however thin, must have foundations in the ground or upon well-founded arches.
Fire-safe mezzanines: brick, vaults, and enclosed oak ties
The mezzanine floors are to be divided by walls of narrow brick and without timber, for fear of fire, and are to be vaulted, growing stronger the smaller they are. Oak tie-beams are to be sealed within the walls so the fire cannot reach them.
Ventilated privies with self-closing counterweighted doors
All the privies are to draw their exhalation through the thickness of the walls and vent through the roofs, and the rooms leading to them are to be many, opening one into another so the stench does not spread through the dwellings. Their doors are all to shut by counterweights.
The large ground-plan: stables, dimensions, and a moat
The great planimetry lays out compartments labeled for servants and stables, with the stable-keeper posted at corner a. One compartment is given as 80 braccia wide and 120 long, with a moat of 10 braccia, beside a note reading 'road of Amboise.'
Proportional division of the palace front
A closing note sets the principal division of the palace front into two parts, so that the width of the courtyard equals half the whole front. The reasoning breaks off before the second division is stated.