Leonardo has become an international commodity. His name is used to market museums, art galleries, exhibitions, as well as all kinds of merchandise. The museums range from great public institutions holding original masterpieces, like the Louvre, to private profit-making displays based on models of his machines with reproductions of his drawings. The exhibitions range from scholarly block-busters, to opportunistic shows that centre on a few very speculative pictures and other items of dubious status. Contenders to be long-lost Leonardos arise with absurd regularity, often supported by reams of meaningless 'research' and uninformative scientific analysis. The stakes are huge, in terms of both fame and fortune. Nearly all of Leonardo's surviving paintings are in public galleries, a type of institution which did not exist when he was active. The transfer of ownership, from private to public, applies to his most famous creation, the Mona Lisa, which has resided in the Musée du Louvre for two centuries.

This raises the question about how the painting came to France, and what happened to it between the early 16th century and the foundation of France's state museum system. This scholarly book looks into such matters and considers the movement of seven of Leonardo's most famous paintings. It shows that the process of their diffusion and the complex lives of Leonardo's paintings have been the result of a variety of disparate and unpredictable factors.