From Renaissance to the 18th century

Some six centuries after Ibn Firnas, Leonardo da Vinci developed a hang glider design in which the inner parts of the wings are fixed, and some control surfaces are provided towards the tips as in the gliding flight in birds. 1). …, he himself never flew in it. Based on his drawings, and using materials that would have been available to him, a prototype constructed in the late 20th century was shown to fly. However, his sketchy design was interpreted with modern knowledge of aerodynamic principles, and whether his actual ideas would have worked is not known. A model he built for a test flight in 1496 did not fly, and some other designs, such as the four-person screw-type helicopter, had severe flaws.

Italian inventor, Tito Livio Burattini, built a model aircraft with four fixed glider wings in 1647. Described as "four pairs of wings attached to an elaborate 'dragon'", it was said to have successfully lifted a cat in 1648 but not Burattini himself. He promised that "only the most minor injuries" would result from landing the craft. His "Dragon Volant" is considered "the most elaborate and sophisticated aeroplane to be built before the 19th century".

In 1670 Francesco Lana de Terzi published the work which suggested that lighter than air flight would be possible. He supposed that copper foil spheres that contained vacuum would be lighter than the displaced air and lift an airship. 2). …, he did fail to realize that the pressure of the surrounding air would crush the spheres.

In 1709 Bartolomeu de Gusmão presented a petition to King John V of Portugal, begging for support for his invention of an airship. The public test of the machine, which was set for June 24, 1709, did not take place. According to contemporary reports, however, Gusmão appeared to have made several less ambitious experiments with this machine. It is certain that Gusmão was working on this principle at the public exhibition he gave before the Court on August 8, 1709, in a hall in Lisbon, 3). ….

1783 was a watershed year for ballooning and aviation, between June 4 and December 1 five aviation firsts were achieved in France.

On 4 June, the Montgolfier brothers demonstrated their unmanned hot air balloon.

On 27 August, Jacques Charles and the Robert brothers launched the world's first (unmanned) hydrogen-filled balloon.

On 19 October, the Montgolfiers launched the first manned flight, a tethered balloon with humans on board. The aviators were the scientist Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, the manufacture manager Jean-Baptiste Réveillon, and Giroud de Villette.

On 21 November, the Montgolfiers launched the first free flight with human passengers. King Louis XVI had originally decreed that condemned criminals would be the first pilots, but Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, along with the Marquis François d'Arlandes, successfully petitioned for the honor. They drifted 8 km (5.0 mi) in a balloon powered by a wood fire.

On 1 December, Jacques Charles and the Nicolas-Louis Robert launched their manned hydrogen balloon amid a crowd of 400,000. They ascended to a height of about 1,800 feet (550 m) and landed at sunset after a flight of 2 hours and 5 minutes, covering 36 km. After Robert alighted Charles decided to ascend alone. This time he ascended rapidly to an altitude of about 3,000 metres, 4). …, suffered extreme pain in his ears, and never flew again.

Ballooning became a major "rage" in Europe in the late 18th century, 5). ….

Work on developing a steerable (or dirigible) balloon (now called an airship) continued sporadically throughout the 19th century. The first powered, controlled, sustained lighter-than-air flight is believed to have taken place in 1852 when Henri Giffard flew 15 miles (24 km) in France, with a steam engine driven craft.

Non-steerable balloons were employed during the American Civil War. The young Ferdinand von Zeppelin first flew as a balloon passenger with the Union Army of the Potomac in 1863.

Another advance was made in 1884, when the first fully controllable free-flight was made in a French Army by an electric-powered airship, La France, by Charles Renard and Arthur Krebs. The 170-foot (52 m) long, 66,000-cubic-foot (1,900 m3) airship covered 8 km (5.0 mi) in 23 minutes 6). …

However, these aircraft were generally short-lived and extremely frail. Routine, controlled flights would occur until the advent of the internal combustion engine. Although airships were used in both World War I and II, and continue on a limited basis to this day, their development has been largely overshadowed by heavier-than-air craft.