# The Mona Lisa may have been a man, baby. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 3, 2011, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079 "2011-02-03T23:03:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2011, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079/1 "2011-02-03T23:03:10Z")
According to an Italian team of investigators, the model for the Mona Lisa may have been one of Leonardo’s [apprentices (with benefits)](http://www.usnewssource.com/headlines/da-vincis-mona-lisa-model-was-a-man-named-salai_186426.html): > [@](#): > > 60-year-old Silvano Vincenti, the head of the National Historic Commission in Italy, said at a press conference in Rome Wednesday that the model was Gian Giacomo Caprotti or nicknamed “Salai”, one of da Vinci’s male apprentices, with whom he probably had a love affair. Caprotti began to work as a model with da Vinci at the age of 10, and continued to work for him for more than 20 years. Vincenti points to other work from da Vinci that had similar appearances to the Mona Lisa, as well as other Renaissance artists like John the Baptist and Angel Incarnate, who had worked with the model. > > “Salai was very handsome and probably Leonardo’s lover,” Vinceti said. “Salai was a favorite model for Leonardo. He certainly inserted characteristics of Salai in the Mona Lisa.” > > Vincenti also claims that da Vinci painted the letters ‘L’ and ‘S’ in the eyes of Mona Lisa, which stand for ‘Leonardo’ and ‘Salai’. ---
**Author:** ![toofs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4491bb/32.png) [@toofs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toofs)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2011, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079/2 "2011-02-03T23:19:52Z")
Guess it is the Manny Lisa from here out. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2011, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079/3 "2011-02-03T23:30:50Z")
Leonardo Da Vinci’s _The Apprentice_ would be a great show for a gay porn channel. > [@](#): > > LdV: Giacamo… you’re fired! > > Gia: Please Mr. D, isn’t there anything I can do to make it up to you? > > LdV: Well… maybe a one or a two things…there’s this painting of the abduction of Ganymede I could use a sort of model for… There’s also a theory that comes up from time to time that it’s a [self-portrait](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speculation_about_Mona_Lisa)of Leo in drag. (My theory is that if there’s a resemblance it could be less narcissistic than that- Leo’s father had many children by his wife and by other women so there were probably a lot of women around who would have looked like him.) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079/4 "2011-02-04T01:43:41Z")
Elsewhere in the OP’s link: > [@](#): > > Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece, La Joconde, La Gioconda or better known as the Mona Lisa, is a 16th-century portrait of Lisa Gherardini, the wife of the wealthy Francesco del Giocondo, a local merchant. At least that was what we thought. […] > > Louvre experts have called Vincenti’s theory ‘groundless’ and say they checked the painting twice in 2004 and 2009 and no inscriptions, letters or numbers were found during the tests, but the ageing of the painting has caused a number of cracks to appear in the paint, which have caused a number of shapes to appear that have often been subject to over-interpretation. > > According to the Louvre, Vincenti has never had access to the painting to investigate it properly. Anyway, [Wiki sez](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mona_Lisa) that a contemporary note documenting the identity of the Mona Lisa model with Lisa, the wife of del Giocondo, dates from 1503, around the time when the painting was begun. While I’m not disputing that Renaissance painters sometimes had their male assistants stand in for models of female figures or that some of them had homosexual affairs, I think we’d need **way** better evidence than this to conclude that Leonardo’s model for _La Gioconda_ was not in fact the historically documented wife of del Giocondo. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2011, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079/5 "2011-02-04T02:00:03Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > According to an Italian team of investigators, the model for the Mona Lisa may have been one of Leonardo’s [apprentices (with benefits)](http://www.usnewssource.com/headlines/da-vincis-mona-lisa-model-was-a-man-named-salai_186426.html): Well, _that_ explains the mysterious smile… ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2011, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-mona-lisa-may-have-been-a-man-baby/570079/6 "2011-02-04T02:04:33Z")
[The implications for Little Milton are staggering.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DaaJ4EPYwI) That said I never believe theories like this. They’re usually just pleas for attention and they’re rarely backed by good scholarship.