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The Codex Leicester

You might know this author’s name: Leonardo da Vinci. You might know the buyer’s name as well: Bill Gates. The current record for the most expensive book of all time belongs to this 72-page notebook filled with the Renaissance genius’s notes and theories. In the early 1700s, the Codex was purchased by the Earl of Leicester, hence its name. In 1980, an art collector bought it from the Leicester estate, and none other than Bill Gates bought it from the collector in 1994. The Codex set Gates back a cool $30.8 million. Gates decided to share his purchase with the world, and did it in the most Bill Gates way possible: he scanned the pages of the book and turned them into a Windows 95 screensaver. Next, check out the most overdue library books that ever made it back to the library.