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Leonardo da Vinci was also a pioneer of social distancing, French Renaissance chateau discovers

Double-Helix Staircase Presumably Designed By Leonardo Da Vinci In The Chateau De Chambord, France - Insights
Double-Helix Staircase Presumably Designed By Leonardo Da Vinci In The Chateau De Chambord, France - Insights

He is credited with inventing the machine gun, the helicopter and the parachute.

Few knew, however, that Leonard da Vinci was also a pioneer in social distancing.

Yet that is the claim of curators at the chateau de Chambord, the grandest of all French Renaissance castles in the Loire valley.

They say that its double-helix “DNA” staircase the legendary Italian polymath is believed to have designed means visitors never have to cross paths: the two spirals ascend the three floors without ever meeting, illuminated from above by a sort of lighthouse at the highest point of the château.

Thanks to the genius of the man behind the Mona Lisa, social distancing at the castle - which reopened on Friday after almost ten weeks of coronavirus lockdown - is child’s play as visitors ascend and descend via different entrances.

The French Renaissance chateau de Chambord in the Loire -  LUDOVIC MARIN/ AFP
The French Renaissance chateau de Chambord in the Loire - LUDOVIC MARIN/ AFP

“The Romans already used this type of double spiral staircase to allow one garrison to relieve another without soldiers having to cross paths, jostle each other or communicate their respective passwords,” said Jean d’Haussonville, president of the Chambord domaine.

“Leonardo da Vinci above all designed it as a sort of architectural stage management, namely to spot every now and again someone coming up at the same time as you without understanding from where they are coming, where they are going. That’s one of the surprise effects that the Renaissance were so fond of," he told Le Point.

Da Vinci spent the last three years of his life in the Loire at the Château du Clos Lucé, some 32 miles from Chambord, as “First Painter, Architect & Engineer to the King”, Francis I.

Besides Chambord, which turned 500 last year, the rest of the Loire chateaus have been gradually reopening since France launched phase two of its lockdown exit plan last week.

The Palace at Versailles is also due to reopen on Saturday with visitors obliged to wear masks. The French will have the place all to themselves as foreign tourists are currently not allowed into the country. They will be the first to see Louis XIV’s spruced up “hall of mirrors”, which received its first overhaul during confinement in over a decade.

While many French monuments and museums are already opening up, some remain closed.

The Louvre museum, for example, will only reopen on July 6.