Leonardo da Vinci designed a humanoid machine known as the mechanical knight.
The robot was created for a court celebration in Milan around 1495, during Leonardo’s work for Ludovico Sforza. Reconstructions based on his notes and drawings suggest that the knight could sit, stand, move its arms, and operate its jaw through an internal system of pulleys, cables, and gears.
The original machine has not survived, so the exact extent of its movements is uncertain. Modern builders have produced working interpretations, but these are reconstructions rather than preserved evidence of every action performed by Leonardo’s machine.
The mechanical knight is distinct from Leonardo’s self-propelled cart and mechanical lion. The cart was a wheeled programmable device, while the lion was a ceremonial automaton. The knight is notable for applying mechanical principles to a human-shaped body.