Since he first learned to make them, weapons have been among man's most prized possessions. Over the ages, crafts men, armorers and artists lavished their labor to make them both functional and beautiful, from the gold-encrusted swords of kings to magnificently engraved crossbows for the attendant men-at-arms. But in the long history of weaponry, nothing quite matches the superb decoration of firearms developed during the Renaissance when physics and art, ballistics and sculpture were united under the guidance of such artistic geniuses as Leonardo da Vinci.
The wealth of invention and artistry...
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