The enigmatic smile of the Mona Lisa in Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece has intrigued experts for centuries, but an Italian art historian now claims to have found out the real identity of Mona Lisa after studying numbers and letters in her eyes and on the bridge in the background。
Last month a series of numbers and letters were found in the eyes of the Mona Lisa, as well as on the bridge over her left shoulder. Now art historian Carla Glori says the structure of the arched bridge was similar to the one that crossed the River Trebbia and which was washed away in 1472 - the last two numbers being painted into the bridge。
Glori also said that she was confident the woman in the painting was Bianca Giovanna Sforza. She was the daughter of Ludovico il Moro, the nobleman who controlled Bobbio and who lived 500 years ago - the letters said to have been found in the Mona Lisa's eye last month are said to be S and G, two of Bianca's initials。
Glori said:" From my research I have identified the subject as Bianca Giovanna Sforza and the bridge in the background is the one that spanned the River Trebbia at Bobbio. Five hundred years ago Bobbio was an important centre of culture famous for its library. It's highly likely that Da Vinci visited Bobbio because of its famous library."
But retired Oxford University professor Martin Kemp - a Da Vinci expert - is not convinced by Miss Glori's theory. "The portrait is almost certainly of Lisa del Giocondo. There have been many attempts to identify the landscape as a specific location and I do not find the resemblance to the Bobbio bridge all that close."