Leonardo da Vinci’s vertical-lift concept was called the aerial screw.
Leonardo drew the aerial screw around 1489. The design featured a helical, linen-covered surface mounted on a central framework. He reasoned that rotating the screw could cause it to rise through the air, an idea often compared with the principle of a helicopter rotor.
The machine was never built or tested by Leonardo, and it lacked a practical power source capable of turning the large structure fast enough. Its importance is conceptual: it shows Leonardo thinking about vertical flight separately from birdlike flapping flight.
The aerial screw is sometimes casually called Leonardo’s helicopter, but that wording can be misleading. Modern helicopters use powered rotors, aerodynamic blades, and control systems that are fundamentally more refined than the Renaissance sketch.