The Real Leonardo Continued

Brown himself notes the next problem, which he never satisfactorily answers. The painting depicts thirteen people. If Mary Magdalene is supposed to be at Jesus’ right hand, that leaves only 11 Apostles. Who is missing? Which of the twelve apostles opted out of the Last Supper? The only Apostle who eventually leaves the meeting, according to the Gospel, is Judas. Yet Judas is clearly pictured in Leonardo’s painting, and the scene portrayed involves Judas himself asking: “Is it I, Lord?”

Brown relies on Leonardo's soft-featured, beardless depiction of John to support his fantastic claim that we are dealing with a woman. This assumption merely reveals Brown’s lack of familiarity with "types" in the artistic conventions of the day. In his Treatise on Painting, Leonardo himself explains that each figure should be painted according to his station and age. A wise man has certain characteristics, an old woman others, and children others still.

A classic type, common to many Renaissance paintings, is the "student." A favored follower, a protégé or disciple, is always portrayed as very youthful, long-haired and clean-shaven; with none of the hard, determined physiognomy of more weathered men, to show that he has not yet matured to the point where he will question his teacher.

Throughout the Renaissance, artists habitually portray St. John in this fashion. John is the trusting student who reclines on Jesus’ breast, the only Apostle present at the foot of the cross. A quick comparison with the "Last Supper" of Ghirlandaio and Andrea del Castagno shows a similarly soft-featured, young John.

Brown’s explanation of the symbols of the painting dwells on shapes and letters that Brown finds in the scene, much as a fortune teller “finds” all sorts of images in clouds and tea leaves. Focusing on negative shapes (the empty space next to Christ as a ‘V’ as opposed to the solid triangle of Jesus), he completely misses the point. The “M” Brown sees in Jesus and “Magdalene” makes for a pretty lopsided letter as the second group is lower than the figure of Christ. Even if one were to play along with Brown’s unhinged hermeneutics, the letters “V and M” would seem more likely to indicate the Virgin Mary, a figure that Brown studiously avoids throughout the novel.

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