As in many other areas, Leonardo da Vinci was a pioneer in the field of map making.

Large-scale mapping was a relatively well-developed science before Leonardo’s time. However, detailed and accurate town maps were still impossible to produce.
Enter Leonardo.

In 1502, at the age of 50, he decided to bid for the patronage of Cesare Borgia, a powerful Italian duke. His method was to produce a map of Cesare’s stronghold town of Imola (better known now days for hosting an F1 Grand Prix). The map, an aerial view of the town, was staggering in it’s accuracy. The duke was stunned, and hired Leonardo on the spot.
Sadly, this didn’t last long, as Cesare was overthrown the next year and Leonardo was quickly onto his next unfinished project.

When asked, Leonard was coy as to his actual methods.
Eventually, he admitted that he had laboriously walked and measured every street in Imola.
This was only half-true.

What da Vinci successfully covered-up was the complete failure of his initial plan. The one which used a radical inflated bladder (or ‘balloon’) to carry an assistant, sketch book in hand, in a small wicker basket high above the city. A plan that was as brilliant as it was inevitably fatal to the assistants.

After many had crashed to earth, been blown away, or, in one memorable case, been carried off by the Giant Roc (which turned out not to be so mythical after all), Leonardo cut his losses and resorted to the more down-to-earth method.

Even genius has it’s limits.

“My name is Derek Walton, and this scrap of paper will be probably be my last will and testament.

I have been stranded on this island for what now seems an eternity. It is a barren and featureless place, completely cut off from the world, where the sun beats down with the merciless ferocity.

There are only a few tough shrubs that are edible, and I doubt these will sustain me for long. Indeed, I think my hunger has already caused me to hallucinate. I can almost see my long-lost family beckoning me from the horizon. Their plaintive cries a reminder of how hopeless my situation is.

I fear my end is not far away, and must stop writing now. I can only hope that some future traveler will find this note and I will not be totally forgotten by the world.”

(30 minutes later Derek was rescued from the traffic island on the Bereksford bypass and reunited with his family, who had been waiting patiently on the hard shoulder. Shortly after, his wife was recorded as telling him “to pull yourself together and not to be such a drama queen!”)