The New Moon In The Old Moon's Arms.

The unlit hemisphere of the Moon glows weakly from earthshine as she rises over predawn Leith.

This phenomenon was first explained by Leonardo da Vinci in one of his scientific journals - one that became known as the Codex Leicester after Thomas Coke, who later became Earl of Leicester, purchased it in 1717.

This remarkable 72-page tome - written between 1506 and 1510 and lavishly illustrated - expounded the famous Renaissance polymath's scientific vision, not least this explaination of lunar luminosity a century before Galileo's telescope and Johannes Kepler, but also a version of plate tectonics to explain the hereto puzzling explanation why fossils were found in mountains 450 years before the idea became accepted.

There's a lot to be said for an enquiring mind.