Leonardo da Vinci sketched a parachute in 1485 as a device that could slow a person's fall from a height.
His design used a pyramid-shaped wooden frame covered with linen cloth. Leonardo estimated that a structure about 12 braccia wide and 12 braccia deep could allow a person to descend safely. A braccio was a historical Italian unit of length, so the exact modern dimensions are debated.
The drawing appears in the Codex Atlanticus, a large collection of Leonardo's notes and sketches. It was a theoretical design rather than a documented working parachute, and Leonardo did not record a test flight.
Modern parachutes use flexible canopies, suspension lines, and harnesses, making them very different from Leonardo's rigid pyramid. In 2000, British skydiver Adrian Nichols tested a replica of the design, but he used a modern parachute for the final part of the descent because the replica was difficult to control.