In 2003, there were a few things that were totally inescapable: trucker hats and studded belts were everywhere, people were nuts for Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings Trilogy, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix became the best-selling book of the year. But also huge, and equally inescapable, was the second-highest grossing book of that year: Dan Brown’s smash hit, The Da Vinci Code. I remember that I, a graduate student in art history, grabbed a copy at my local bookstore—sorry not sorry, and spent the entire weekend devouring it—really only taking a break here and there to make myself some snacks before diving back headlong into its narrative. By now, you probably know the story: Brown’s “symbologist,” Robert Langdon and his cryptologist colleague Sophie Neveu struggle to solve a murder couched in symbols that translate to spell out incredible consequences—for world religion, and thus for the world at large. And the bombshell claims that this fictional book—and I stress, fictional-- made were many, and two-decade-long spoiler alert, by the by: Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, and after his death she fled to what would become France and bore him a daughter, whose descendants founded the Merovingian line of French kings. This secret has been kept throughout the centuries, first by the Knights Templar, then after their destruction by the Priory of Sion, a secretive group led over the years by many great men, including, as the title so clearly states, Leonardo da Vinci. Most fascinatingly, Dan Brown wrote that Leonardo had revealed these—and many more—secrets in his paintings: the “Da Vinci Code.” It’s an irresistible premise, and it was catnip even for an art historian like me who should have known better… and hopefully did know better. But ever since its publication, many have wondered: is there really a “Da Vinci Code?” And if so, what painting might truly contain allusions to these secrets?
