Leonardo da Vinci's tomb at Amboise

What actually happened, in order

Leonardo came to France in 1516 at the invitation of François I and lived his last three years at the Clos Lucé, the manor a few hundred metres up the hill. He died there on 2 May 1519 and asked to be buried in the collegiate church of Saint-Florentin, inside the château walls.

That church did not survive. It was damaged, deconsecrated and demolished in the aftermath of the Revolution, and its graves went with it. For most of the nineteenth century Leonardo’s burial place was simply lost.

In 1863 the writer Arsène Houssaye excavated the site and recovered bones which he identified as Leonardo’s — on grounds of position, of fragments of an inscription, and of a skull he considered to match the portraits. In 1874 those remains were placed in the Saint-Hubert chapel, and the slab you see today was recut in 1930.

The honest sentence

This is Leonardo’s tomb by tradition, by a nineteenth-century identification and by the consent of everyone since. It is not his tomb by proof: no modern test has confirmed the remains, and the chain of custody runs through a demolished church and an enthusiastic Romantic. I think that makes the chapel more interesting rather than less, and I set out the arguments on both sides on is it really Leonardo.

What you actually see

A carved stone slab set into the chapel floor, with his name and a medallion portrait, lilies of France and the arms of the house. The chapel around it is the real surprise: tiny, flamboyant, late fifteenth century, with the Saint Hubert hunt carved over the outside door. It takes four minutes, which is why so many visitors do it last and barely look — do it first instead: the chapel page.

Visiting

The chapel is inside the ticketed area and needs no separate ticket. The entrance is bought at the château desk; the day trip below includes it.

A reminder: what you book above is the guiding, or a day that includes entry. The Château Royal d’Amboise has no online entrance ticket — you buy that at the château’s own desk, and its guided visits are included in it.

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