With little knowledge of art history, or in fact history, you could be forgiven for getting embroiled in the fantasy that Dan Brown and Ron Howard create in the form of novel and film, as they paint a rather convincing picture, of a possibly more interesting and controversial history. Was Leonardo the man that Brown claims? A cheeky Grand Master of the Priory of Sion, trying to leave hints in his work as to the secret he was keeping from the world; or did Brown take a small step back from the seemingly equally likely scenario; that Leonardo was in fact the leader of an elite foursome of Renaissance artists come Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Was Leonardo a keeper of the greatest secret of all time? Not likely! Any proof? Well my spell-checker knows nothing of the existence of this Priory of Sion. As that is about as much evidence as Dan Brown seems to have to support his theories it should be plenty to base my argument on… but I shall continue just in case you disagree.
The claim that Leonardo was a Grand Master of this secret society first came from the secret dossiers found and hidden in the National Library in France by Pierre Plantard; they have since been discredited as an elaborate hoax by historians and the judicial system. Plantard, with the help of a friend forged several documents; these documents speak of the Priory of Sion as well as listing the Grand Masters of the Priory. Included on that list is the 12th Grand Master Leonardo Da Vinci who reigned between 1510 and 1519. The pseudo historical novel The Holy Blood, Holy Grail was written using these fabricated dossiers as evidence. This novel was also one of Brown’s primary sources. Therefore the inaccuracies in The Holy Blood, Holy Grail are just reiterated in Brown’s novel and the subsequent movie. These somewhat blurry conspiracy theories are fine as they are, but when someone attempts to turn theory into fact controversy and criticism is inevitable. This discredits Brown’s fact...