Welcome to On Verticality. This blog explores the innate human need to escape the surface of the earth, and our struggles to do so throughout history. If you’re new here, a good place to start is the Theory of Verticality section or the Introduction to Verticality. If you want to receive updates on what’s new with the blog, you can use the Subscribe page to sign up. Thanks for visiting!
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John Damian de Falcuis, the False Friar of Tongland
Pictured above is John Damian, an Italian alchemist best known for an attempt at human flight in 1507. At the time, Damian had been employed by King James IV as an alchemist, and his job was to create gold from more common materials. After he failed to do so and word got around that he was a fraud, he declared he would fly to France with a pair of wings he invented in an attempt to prove his critics wrong,