What Leonardo da Vinci invention is commonly called the first parachute design?

Leonardo da Vinci’s commonly cited first parachute design is the pyramidal parachute. He drew it around 1485 in the Codex Atlanticus, describing a linen canopy stretched over a wooden framework. The design has four triangular sides meeting at a point, giving it a pyramid-like shape.

Leonardo wrote that a person could jump from a great height while protected by a structure about 12 braccia wide and 12 braccia deep. A braccio was a historical Italian unit whose exact length varied, so modern descriptions usually preserve Leonardo’s dimensions without treating them as a precise modern measurement.

The drawing was a theoretical design, not evidence that Leonardo tested it. In 2000, British skydiver Adrian Nichols built and tested a modern reconstruction, finding that it could descend successfully after being towed into the air, although he used a separate parachute for safety. Leonardo’s design is often called the first engineered parachute concept, while later parachutes used flexible, rounded canopies.