Leonardo da Vinci designed a crane with a geared winch and movable boom for lifting heavy loads.
His notebooks contain several crane designs for construction and engineering work. They combine frames, pulleys, gears, ropes, and winches so that a worker could raise or reposition materials with controlled mechanical advantage. Some designs also allowed the boom or load to swing, extending the machine’s usefulness beyond a simple vertical lift.
These were not standardized industrial cranes in the modern sense. Leonardo drew alternative mechanisms for different tasks, including building, excavation, and handling large materials. His studies show how he analyzed force, friction, winding, and the path of a suspended load.
A crane differs from a windlass, which is primarily a drum or cylinder for winding rope. A crane is the complete lifting machine, usually including a supporting frame and projecting boom. Leonardo’s designs helped document the mechanical possibilities of Renaissance construction equipment.