PARIS — For centuries, the “Mona Lisa” has beguiled art buffs unable to resist speculating on its features. Now a French inventor claims digital scanning reveals the fate of the enigmatic subject’s famously missing eyebrows and lashes.
Leonardo Da Vinci’s 16th-century portrait of a Florentine merchant’s wife originally included both brows and lashes, according to Parisian engineer Pascal Cotte, who says his 240-megapixel scans of the painting reveal traces of Mona Lisa’s left brow, obliterated by long-ago restoration efforts.
Using sensors to detect light from both the visible spectrum and the infrared and ultraviolet ranges invisible to the human eye, Cotte said, his camera allowed him to make these and other findings:
Da Vinci changed his mind about the position of two fingers on the subject’s left hand.
Her face was originally wider and the smile more expressive than Da Vinci ultimately painted them.
She holds a blanket that has all but faded from view today.
Afghanistan: 20 Taliban die
U.S. forces fought fierce battles with suspected Taliban militants in eastern Afghanistan, killing 20 insurgents and one civilian, officials said Sunday. Maj. Charles Anthony, spokesman for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, said elders in the area indicated that the suspected militants had used civilians as human shields or fired on NATO forces from positions with civilians in the area.
China: Tibet police, monks clash
Police in Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, clashed for four days with Buddhist monks trying to celebrate the awarding of a congressional honor for the Dalai Lama in Washington, a Hong Kong newspaper reported Sunday. It said that after the clash, the Zhaibung monastery was surrounded by 3,000 armed police who refused to allow more than 1,000 monks leave. It gave no other details.
Israel: Plot to kill prime minister
Israeli officials on Sunday said they foiled a recent attempt by Palestinian militants to assassinate Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during an August trip to the West Bank. Palestinian Prime Minster Salam Fayyad played down the incident, saying Olmert was never seriously threatened. He said three suspects were arrested, and only released after three months of questioning. Palestinian officials said they re-arrested two of the men last week under Israeli pressure.
Mexico: Tropical storm weakens
Tropical Storm Kiko weakened Sunday as it moved slowly away from Mexico’s Pacific coast, forecasters said. Kiko’s eye is well offshore, although forecasters at the U.S. National Hurricane Center said tropical storm conditions could be felt in Baja California over the next couple of days. The storm is then expected to head out to sea and not threaten land directly, the center said.
California: Gas up 5 cents
The national average price for gasoline rose about 5 cents over the last two weeks, according to a survey released Sunday in Camarillo. The average price of regular gasoline Friday was $2.80 a gallon, oil industry analyst Trilby Lundberg said.
D.C.: Cabinet turns to blogging
Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff are the first two members of President Bush’s Cabinet who are blogging. The State Department has begun a blog, too, although Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is not a contributor so far. Chertoff and Leavitt discuss issues facing their departments and occasionally sound off on criticism of their policies.
Puerto Rico: Pet killing protest
Hundreds of protesters in San Juan marched Sunday in solidarity with grieving pet owners whose dogs and cats were thrown to their deaths from a bridge earlier this month, at a demonstration outside Puerto Rico’s capitol. Dozens of dead and wounded dogs and cats were found beneath a 50-foot bridge a day after a forced, mass round up of pets and strays at three low-income housing complexes in Barceloneta.
N.Y.: Cabbies planning a strike
Taxi drivers angry about a new rule requiring the installation of global positioning systems and credit card machines in cabs are planning a second one-day strike today. The city was preparing for the strike by the Taxi Workers Alliance by instituting a contingency plan that lets drivers pick up multiple passengers and charge zone-based fares. The alliance opposes the technology, saying the 5 percent surcharge on each credit card transaction amounts to a wage cut and the GPS device allows cab companies to track drivers.
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