Every famous person is remembered or known for possessing certain skills, abilities, accomplishments or for certain contributions towards the society or humanity in general. As a result, it is important to establish the journey or steps that facilitated the actions of famous people, thus understanding what made possible their contributions. Various factors can be considered in the establishment of the contributing factors towards one's accomplishments and contributions to the society, including their development from childhood to adulthood. Understanding the development areas in a person’s stages of life enhances the understanding of what drove their actions, thus accomplishments and contributions to the society or humanity. Leonardo Da Vinci was renowned as the "Mind of the Renaissance," whose genius is timeless and can be attributed to the experiences in his different stages of life (Malam, 2014) . The aim of this paper, therefore, is to discuss four stages of Leonardo’s life, with particular attention certain areas of development within those stages of his life.
Early Childhood Life of Leonardo Da Vinci
Leonardo Da Vinci was born on the 15 th of April, 1 452, in the town of Vinci to Ser Piero, his father, and Caterina, his mother. Having been born an illegitimate child, Leonardo’s fate with regards to attending the university and becoming a notary like his father was sealed as no illegitimate child at the time could do the same. Leonardo lived with his mother and stepfather until he was three when his biological father took him in (Malam, 2014) . The idea of letting the baby Da Vinci stay with his mother for the first three years of infancy was done in a bid to ensure the proper physical development of the baby through breastfeeding. This promoted the growth and development of a physically healthy child as is noted in the books of historians. According to historians, Da Vinci, during his childhood, did not spend much time with his parents, which contributed to some aspects of development during his childhood.
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Leonardo’s parents were not constantly present in his life as his father was busy working in near Florence, while his mother got married shortly after his birth and later on went on to have legitimate children. Da Vinci spent most of his childhood with his paternal uncle, Francesco, a farmer. Thus Da Vinci spent time outdoors interacting with nature and observing the outdoor (Malam, 2014) . In addition to his personal development being affected by the fact that he was an illegitimate child, Da Vinci did not spend most of his time with his parents. As a result, this also influenced both his cognitive and emotional development during his childhood. For instance, Da Vinci felt abandoned by his parents, which had negative implications on his emotional development as it expected.
Psychologists today argue that children who are neglected during childhood develop post-traumatic stress disorders, as well as trouble becoming emotionally attached, which is the case with Da Vinci (Starr & Wolfe, 1991) . Therefore regarding the implication his feelings of abandonment, Da Vinci cognitive development was positively influenced as it taught him independence at an early stage just by observing his environment and understating that he was probably his greatest chance at a good life. However, emotionally, the abandonment caused him to become emotionally closed off as a child, which was also notable to some certain extent, in his adulthood.
Regarding Da Vinci’s social and psychological development during the state at his life of childhood, the feeling of abandonment may have had negative implications. This is because, as an illegitimate child, Da Vinci was mostly isolated or unable to interact with other children since he could not even receive a formal education. This caused him to have poor social development, thus he did not necessarily have such a social childhood, which in turn influenced his psychological development. Abandonment during childhood causes one to experience loneliness and psychological trauma and experience loneliness, thus poor or slow social and psychological development at the time (Starr & Wolfe, 1991) . The idea of slow social development is reinforced by the fact that not even were his parents around him that much, which left him feeling abandoned and left him lonely as well.
In addition to that, the fact that Da Vinci was an illegitimate child, he did to receive certainly privileged such as receiving a formal education. Thus he had to learn by himself by developing his habitual autodidacticism (Malam, 2014) . The fact that Da Vinci developed autodidacticism is an indication of his great cognitive development as a child, despite the fact that he was an illegitimate child that had not many opportunities in his community and town. Cognitive development is associated with the building of learning skills such as thinking, attention as well as memory (Taylor, 2004) . The fact that Da Vinci was able to teach himself subjects such as human anatomy, Latin, and physics is a clear indication of normal to above average cognitive development. This is because it requires attention to learn something one did not previously know, memory to remember what they learnt as well as thinking to process the very information one learns.
Although Da Vinci did not receive a formal education, when he was 15, his father apprenticed him to Andrea del Verrocchio, a well noted painter and sculpture in Florence (Malam, 2014) . This experience in childhood was Da Vinci’s entry into the world of art, which he would later become known for as he entered adulthood. During his time under the apprenticeship of Verrochio, Da Vinci’s cognitive development grew owing to the positive contributions of refining his painting as well as sculpting skills. Cognitive development, seeing as it entails development of learning skills, can be developed from observation and constant practise (Taylor, 2004) . Da Vinci, in addition to his genius, learnt through observing Verrocchio, which is attributed to his cognitive development at the time in his life when he was transitioning from late childhood into early adulthood.
Similarly, most of the things that Da Vinci observed during his childhood would become some of his greatest and famous works, thus demonstrating his proper cognitive development during childhood. Historians point out that Da Vinci provided insight on what inspired his interests in flight, which is also a demonstration of cognitive development during infancy. To that effect, the historians mention that Da Vinci shared a memory of a bird (Kite) that landed on him, flattering its tail feather severally on his mouth (Malam, 2014) . Historians argue that the traumatic experience is attributed to the renowned artist’s emotional development as is common with childhood traumatic experiences (Starr & Wolfe, 1991) . However, this had a positive impact on his emotional development with regards to fuelling his ambition and interest in flight. The experience also positively influenced his cognitive development because Da Vinci was able to tap into a childhood memory, learn from it and develop ideas from the same (Sigelman & Rider, 2014) .
Adulthood Life of Leonardo Da Vinci
In 1472, when Da Vinci was 20 years old, the painters’ guild of Florence offered the young adult membership, but he turned it down and continued to stay with Verrocchio. However, he remained with Verrocchio up until 1478, when he had become an independent master (Malam, 2014) . This goes to show that during his early adulthood years, Da Vinci’s cognitive, as well as emotional development was well balanced and at their peak. Regarding his emotional development at this stage in life Da Vinci demonstrated soberness by turning down the painters’ guild offer of membership. Typically, such an offer would be regarded as a great opportunity and may cause a person to act on the offer without giving it much thought. However, Da Vinci demonstrated maturity and emotional stability by refusing the offer in a bid to improve himself further, thus demonstrating emotional growth. Similarly, the act of refusing the offer was a demonstration of the status of cognitive development that the “Renaissance man” had achieved. The fact that he was able to think around the odder in the realization of the need to improve himself further instead of taking up the offer is a demonstration of above average cognitive development.
After many years with Verrocchio, at around 1482 Da Vinci began commissioned work and shortly after moved to Milan in pursuit of a career as a painter, sculptor, architect, as well as a designer of court festivals (Malam, 2014) . The segment in Da Vinci’s life where his career had started to shape up and develop influenced to a certain degree various areas of development in his life. For instance, by working and interacting with the people he worked for and with, his social life developed and improved when compared to how it was lonely and isolated during his childhood life. Similarly, regarding cognitive development, this time marked the greatest strides in this area of development as taking up a career in more than one field opened up his life to new experiences, where he would learn so much more. The activities Da Vinci engaged in as an adult improved and marked great growth in his cognitive development as his thinking, observation and learning skills were greatly improved during this period in his life. At some point, Da Vinci joined.
Late Adulthood, Death, and Dying Of Leonardo Da Vinci
During Da Vinci’s late adulthood years, the famous artist moved around a lot between Milan, Rome, and Florence mainly due to his work as well as periods of instability and war. Da Vinci developed the philosophy that emphasized mankind’s most important sense, which according to him was a sight. “Saper vedere” translated into English spells “knowing how to see” is Da Vinci’s philosophy, which demonstrated his extraordinary cognitive development (Malam, 2014) . Borrowing from his experiences as a child and during his early adult life, Da Vinci was convinced that using one's eyesight. Therefore, he developed his learning skills by observation, using his memory to recall events and thus plan his course of action around that, as well as thinking in line of what he had observed thus exceptional cognitive development.
Conclusion
In 1516, French ruler Francis I offered Da Vinci the title “Premier Painter and Engineer and Architect to the King,” which saw him leave Italy permanently (Malam, 2014) . This marked a significant change in some of the areas of development in his life such as psychological satisfaction. This is because with the offer came the security of living a life characterized by the leisure of doing his drawing and paintings as he leased. During a person’s older age, peace and well-being foster positive psychological development, thus was Da Vinci’s case while living in Château of Cloux, a country manor house in France.
However, some of the drafts by Da Vinci indicate that he may not have been so happy in his final years irrespective of the presence of Melzi in his life, to whom he left his estate. This is an indication that even in his later life, Da Vinci may not have necessarily achieved much social development. Similarly, regarding his state of unhappiness during his final years, his emotional development may have also been negatively influenced, thus poorly developed at the time just as it was during his childhood. However, all the other areas of development within his life such as cognitive, physical and psychological development were above average, thus his legendary life, achievements, and contributions to the society before his death in 1519, 2 nd May.
References
Malam, J. (2014). Leonardo da Vinci .
Sigelman, C. K., & Rider, E. A. (2014). Life-span human development . Cengage Learning.
Starr, R., & Wolfe, D. A. (1991). The Effects of child abuse and neglect: Issues and research . London: Guilford.
Taylor, L. (2004). Introducing cognitive development . Psychology Press.
