Leonardo da Vinci sketched an armored tank with sloping armor and multiple guns.
His fighting vehicle was a covered, conical structure mounted on wheels. Several light cannons projected through openings around the sides, allowing the crew to fire outward while protected by the vehicle’s shell. The sloped surfaces could help deflect incoming projectiles, a principle later associated with armored vehicles.
The machine is commonly called Leonardo’s tank, although it was not a modern tank with tracks, an engine, or a documented battlefield career. The drawing appears in a notebook from the late fifteenth century, and the vehicle would have required people or animals to provide its motive power.
A famous feature of some reconstructions is a possible gearing error that would make the vehicle move backward. Whether intentional or accidental, that detail illustrates why the sketch should be treated as a design study rather than a proven working prototype.