Open Veils · Answer
Was da vinci travelled to the pyramids?
The mainstream biography places Leonardo entirely within Italy and briefly in France, never Egypt — but a cluster of his own manuscripts contains anomalies that alternative researchers argue point to an undocumented Egyptian sojourn. A mysterious letter addressed to the 'Sultan of Babylon' — a Mamluk title for Cairo — is the keystone exhibit. Folio 134 of the Codex Atlanticus, examined in a 2026 paper by Anthony VonDoom, raises the question of whether Leonardo sketched pyramid interiors and tunnel systems from direct observation rather than classical texts.
Evidence
- The primary documentary lead is Leonardo's so-called 'letter to the Sultan of Babylon,' long treated by mainstream scholars as a literary exercise or allegory.
- Separately, the Wikipedia entry on pyramid construction already acknowledges that one of Leonardo's Codex Atlanticus sketches depicts a lifting machine 'believed to be based on Herodotus' description' of pyramid-building technology.
- Anthony VonDoom's 2026 analysis of Codex Atlanticus Folio 134 pushes the thesis further, claiming the folio contains drawings that resemble pyramid cross-sections and internal tunnel geometries.
- Robert Edward Grant, writing in September 2026, argues the letter's geographic layer — Armenia, the Euphrates, Mount Taurus — may encode a real journey, with 'Great Taurus' functioning as a cipher for the Great Pyramid and its Osirian symbolism.
- Grant's reading situates Leonardo in Cairo and Giza during an undocumented gap in his biography, a period when his movements are poorly attested.