''The Da Vinci Code'' is a 2003
mystery
Mystery, The Mystery, Mysteries or The Mysteries may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional characters
*Mystery, a cat character in ''Emily the Strange''
Films
* ''Mystery'' (2012 film), a 2012 Chinese drama film
* ''Mystery'' ( ...
thriller novel
Thriller is a genre of fiction, having numerous, often overlapping subgenres. Thrillers are characterized and defined by the moods they elicit, giving viewers heightened feelings of suspense, excitement, surprise, anticipation and anxiety. Su ...
by
Dan Brown
Daniel Gerhard Brown (born June 22, 1964) is an American author best known for his Thriller (genre), thriller novels, including the Robert Langdon novels ''Angels & Demons'' (2000), ''The Da Vinci Code'' (2003), ''The Lost Symbol'' (2009), ''In ...
. It is Brown's second novel to include the character
Robert Langdon
Professor Robert Langdon is a fictional character created by author Dan Brown for his ''Robert Langdon'' book series: ''Angels & Demons'' (2000), ''The Da Vinci Code'' (2003), ''The Lost Symbol'' (2009), ''Inferno'' (2013) and ''Origin'' (2017 ...
: the first was his 2000 novel ''
Angels & Demons
''Angels & Demons'' is a 2000 bestselling mystery- thriller novel written by American author Dan Brown and published by Pocket Books and then by Corgi Books. The novel introduces the character Robert Langdon, who recurs as the protagonist of Bro ...
''. ''The Da Vinci Code'' follows symbologist
Robert Langdon
Professor Robert Langdon is a fictional character created by author Dan Brown for his ''Robert Langdon'' book series: ''Angels & Demons'' (2000), ''The Da Vinci Code'' (2003), ''The Lost Symbol'' (2009), ''Inferno'' (2013) and ''Origin'' (2017 ...
and
cryptologist Sophie Neveu after a murder in the
Louvre Museum in Paris causes them to become involved in a battle between the
Priory of Sion and
Opus Dei
Opus Dei, formally known as the Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei ( la, Praelatura Sanctae Crucis et Operis Dei), is an institution of the Catholic Church whose members seek personal Christian holiness and strive to imbue their work an ...
over the possibility of
Jesus Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
and
Mary Magdalene
Mary Magdalene (sometimes called Mary of Magdala, or simply the Magdalene or the Madeleine) was a woman who, according to the four canonical gospels, traveled with Jesus as one of his followers and was a witness to crucifixion of Jesus, his cru ...
having had a child together.
The novel explores an alternative religious history, whose central plot point is that the
Merovingian
The Merovingian dynasty () was the ruling family of the Franks from the middle of the 5th century until 751. They first appear as "Kings of the Franks" in the Roman army of northern Gaul. By 509 they had united all the Franks and northern Gauli ...
kings of France
France was ruled by monarchs from the establishment of the Kingdom of West Francia in 843 until the end of the Second French Empire in 1870, with several interruptions.
Classical French historiography usually regards Clovis I () as the first ...
were descended from
the bloodline of Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene, ideas derived from Clive Prince's ''
The Templar Revelation
''The Templar Revelation: Secret Guardians of the True Identity of Christ'' is a book written by Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince and published in 1997 by Transworld Publishers Ltd in Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand. It proposes a fringe ...
'' (1997) and books by
Margaret Starbird
Margaret Leonard Starbird (born June 18, 1942) is the author of seven books arguing for the existence of a secret Christian tradition that held Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, calling it the "Grail heresy", after having set out to discre ...
. The book also refers to ''
The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail'' (1982) though Dan Brown has stated that it was not used as research material.
''The Da Vinci Code'' provoked a popular interest in speculation concerning the
Holy Grail
The Holy Grail (french: Saint Graal, br, Graal Santel, cy, Greal Sanctaidd, kw, Gral) is a treasure that serves as an important motif in Arthurian literature. Various traditions describe the Holy Grail as a cup, dish, or stone with miracul ...
legend and Mary Magdalene's role in the
history of Christianity
The history of Christianity concerns the Christian religion, Christian countries, and the Christians with their various denominations, from the 1st century to the present. Christianity originated with the ministry of Jesus, a Jewish teach ...
. The book has, however, been extensively denounced by many
Christian denominations
Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...
as an attack on the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
, and also consistently criticized by scholars for
its historical and scientific inaccuracies. The novel nonetheless became a massive worldwide
bestseller
A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...
that sold 80 million copies and has been translated into 44 languages. In November 2004,
Random House
Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...
published a Special Illustrated Edition with 160 illustrations. In 2006, a
film adaptation
A film adaptation is the transfer of a work or story, in whole or in part, to a feature film. Although often considered a type of derivative work, film adaptation has been conceptualized recently by academic scholars such as Robert Stam as a dial ...
was released by
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...
.
Plot
Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
curator and
Priory of Sion grand master Jacques Saunière is fatally shot one night at the museum by an albino Catholic monk named Silas, who is working on behalf of someone he knows only as the Teacher, who wishes to discover the location of the "keystone," an item crucial in the search for the
Holy Grail
The Holy Grail (french: Saint Graal, br, Graal Santel, cy, Greal Sanctaidd, kw, Gral) is a treasure that serves as an important motif in Arthurian literature. Various traditions describe the Holy Grail as a cup, dish, or stone with miracul ...
.
After Saunière's body is discovered in the pose of the ''
Vitruvian Man'' by
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
, the police summon Harvard professor Robert Langdon, who is in town on business. Police captain Bezu Fache tells him that he was summoned to help the police decode the cryptic message Saunière left during the final minutes of his life. The message includes a
Fibonacci sequence out of order and an anagram 'O, draconian devil Oh, lame saint'.
Langdon explains to Fache that the pentacle Saunière drew on his chest in his own blood represents an allusion to the goddess and not devil worship, as Fache believes.
Sophie Neveu, a police
cryptographer, secretly explains to Langdon that she is Saunière's estranged granddaughter and that Fache thinks Langdon is the murderer because the last line in her grandfather's message, which was meant for Neveu, said "P.S. Find Robert Langdon," which Fache had erased prior to Langdon's arrival. However, "P.S." does not refer to "
postscript
PostScript (PS) is a page description language in the electronic publishing and desktop publishing realm. It is a dynamically typed, concatenative programming language. It was created at Adobe Systems by John Warnock, Charles Geschke, Doug Br ...
", but rather to Sophie ''—'' the nickname given to her by her grandfather was "Princess Sophie". She understands that her grandfather intended Langdon to decipher the code, which leads to Leonardo da Vinci's ''
Mona Lisa
The ''Mona Lisa'' ( ; it, Gioconda or ; french: Joconde ) is a half-length portrait painting by Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. Considered an archetypal masterpiece of the Italian Renaissance, it has been described as "the best known ...
'', which in turn leads to his painting ''
Madonna of the Rocks
The ''Virgin of the Rocks'' ( it, Vergine delle rocce), sometimes the ''Madonna of the Rocks'', is the name of two paintings by the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci, of the same subject, with a composition which is identical except fo ...
''. They find a pendant that holds the address of the Paris branch of the Depository Bank of Zurich.
Neveu and Langdon escape from the police and visit the bank. In the safe deposit box, they find a box containing the keystone: a
cryptex
The word ''cryptex'' is a neologism coined by the author Dan Brown for his 2003 novel ''The Da Vinci Code'', denoting a portable vault used to hide secret messages. It is a word formed from Greek ''kryptós'', "hidden, secret" and Latin ''codex'' ...
, a cylindrical, hand-held vault with five concentric, rotating dials labeled with letters. When these are lined up correctly, they unlock the device. If the cryptex is forced open, an enclosed vial of vinegar breaks and dissolves the message inside the cryptex, which was written on
papyrus
Papyrus ( ) is a material similar to thick paper that was used in ancient times as a writing surface. It was made from the pith of the papyrus plant, '' Cyperus papyrus'', a wetland sedge. ''Papyrus'' (plural: ''papyri'') can also refer to a ...
. The box containing the cryptex contains clues to its password.
Langdon and Neveu take the keystone to the home of Langdon's friend, Sir Leigh Teabing, an expert on the Holy Grail, the legend of which is heavily connected to the Priory. There, Teabing explains that the Grail is not a cup, but connected to
Mary Magdalene
Mary Magdalene (sometimes called Mary of Magdala, or simply the Magdalene or the Madeleine) was a woman who, according to the four canonical gospels, traveled with Jesus as one of his followers and was a witness to crucifixion of Jesus, his cru ...
, and that she was Jesus Christ's wife and is the person to his right in ''
The Last Supper
Image:The Last Supper - Leonardo Da Vinci - High Resolution 32x16.jpg, 400px, alt=''The Last Supper'' by Leonardo da Vinci - Clickable Image, Depictions of the Last Supper in Christian art have been undertaken by artistic masters for centuries, ...
''.
The trio then flee the country on Teabing's private plane, on which they conclude that the proper combination of letters spells out Neveu's given name, Sofia. Opening the cryptex, they discover a smaller cryptex inside it, along with another riddle that ultimately leads the group to the tomb of
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton (25 December 1642 – 20 March 1726/27) was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author (described in his time as a "natural philosopher"), widely recognised as one of the grea ...
in
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the United ...
.
During the flight to Britain, Neveu reveals the source of her estrangement from her grandfather ten years earlier: arriving home unexpectedly from university, Neveu secretly witnessed a spring fertility rite conducted in the secret basement of her grandfather's country estate. From her hiding place, she was shocked to see her grandfather with a woman at the center of a ritual attended by men and women who were wearing masks and chanting praise to the goddess. She fled the house and broke off all contact with Saunière. Langdon explains that what she witnessed was an ancient ceremony known as ''
hieros gamos
''Hieros gamos'', hieros (ἱερός) meaning "holy" or "sacred" and gamos (γάμος) meaning marriage, or Hierogamy (Greek , "holy marriage"), is a sacred marriage that plays out between a god and a goddess, especially when enacted in a symb ...
'' or "sacred marriage."
By the time they arrive at
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the United ...
, Teabing is revealed to be the Teacher for whom Silas is working. Teabing wishes to use the Holy Grail, which he believes is a series of documents establishing that
Jesus Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
married Mary Magdalene and fathered children, in order to ruin the
Vatican. He compels Langdon at gunpoint to solve the second cryptex's password, which Langdon realizes is "apple." Langdon secretly opens the cryptex and removes its contents before tossing the empty cryptex in the air.
Teabing is arrested by Fache, who by now realizes that Langdon is innocent. Bishop Aringarosa, head of religious sect
Opus Dei
Opus Dei, formally known as the Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei ( la, Praelatura Sanctae Crucis et Operis Dei), is an institution of the Catholic Church whose members seek personal Christian holiness and strive to imbue their work an ...
and Silas' mentor, realizing that Silas has been used to murder innocent people, rushes to help the police find him. When the police find Silas hiding in an Opus Dei Center, Silas assumes that they are there to kill him and he rushes out, accidentally shooting Bishop Aringarosa. Bishop Aringarosa survives but is informed that Silas was found dead later from a gunshot wound.
The final message inside the second keystone leads Neveu and Langdon to
Rosslyn Chapel, whose docent turns out to be Neveu's long-lost brother, who Neveu had been told died as a child in the car accident that killed her parents. The guardian of Rosslyn Chapel, Marie Chauvel Saint Clair, is Neveu's long-lost grandmother. It is revealed that Neveu and her brother are descendants of Mary Magdalene. The Priory of Sion hid her identity to protect her from possible threats to her life.
The real meaning of the last message is that the
Grail is buried beneath the small
pyramid
A pyramid (from el, πυραμίς ') is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge to a single step at the top, making the shape roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilat ...
directly below the ''
La Pyramide Inversée
The Louvre Inverted Pyramid (french: Pyramide inversée du Louvre) is a skylight constructed in the Carrousel du Louvre, an underground shopping mall in front of the Louvre Museum in France. It may be thought of as a smaller sibling of the more ...
'', the inverted glass pyramid of the
Louvre
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
. It also lies beneath the "Rose Line," an allusion to "Rosslyn." Langdon figures out this final piece to the puzzle; he follows the Rose Line (
prime meridian
A prime meridian is an arbitrary meridian (a line of longitude) in a geographic coordinate system at which longitude is defined to be 0°. Together, a prime meridian and its anti-meridian (the 180th meridian in a 360°-system) form a great c ...
) to ''La Pyramide Inversée'', where he kneels to pray before the hidden sarcophagus of Mary Magdalene, as the
Templar knights
, colors = White mantle with a red cross
, colors_label = Attire
, march =
, mascot = Two knights riding a single horse
, equipment ...
did before.
Characters
*
Robert Langdon
Professor Robert Langdon is a fictional character created by author Dan Brown for his ''Robert Langdon'' book series: ''Angels & Demons'' (2000), ''The Da Vinci Code'' (2003), ''The Lost Symbol'' (2009), ''Inferno'' (2013) and ''Origin'' (2017 ...
: A professor of symbology at Harvard University and the protagonist of the novel.
*Jacques Saunière: The grandmaster of the Priory of Sion, Curator of Louvre Museum.
*Sophie Neveu: A cryptologist of the French police and granddaughter of Saunière.
*Bezu Fache: A member of Opus Dei and a French police captain.
*Silas / The Monk: A member of Opus Dei who murders Saunière and the secondary antagonist of the novel.
*Manuel Aringarosa: A bishop of the Vatican and member of Opus Dei.
*Sister Sandrine: A Seneschal of the Priory of Sion and nun of St. Sulpice.
*André Vernet: A guard of Zurich bank.
*Sir Leigh Teabing / The Teacher: A Grail scholar and British expatriate living in Paris, and the main antagonist of the novel.
*Rémy Legaludec: A maid who assists Teabing.
*Jérôme Collet: A French police lieutenant and Fache's deputy.
*Marie Chauvel Saint-Clair: Sophie's grandmother.
Reaction
Sales
''The Da Vinci Code'' was a major success in 2003 and was outsold only by
J. K. Rowling's ''
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
''Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix'' is a fantasy novel written by British author J. K. Rowling and the fifth novel in the ''Harry Potter'' series. It follows Harry Potter's struggles through his fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witc ...
''.
It sold 80 million copies worldwide.
Historical inaccuracies
![Davinciprotestor](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/Davinciprotestor.JPG)
The book generated criticism when it was first published for the inaccurate description of core aspects of Christianity and descriptions of
European art, history, and architecture. The book has received mostly negative reviews from Catholic and other Christian communities.
Many critics took issue with the level of research Brown did when writing the story. ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' writer Laura Miller characterized the novel as "based on a notorious hoax", "rank nonsense", and "bogus", saying the book is heavily based on the fabrications of
Pierre Plantard, who is asserted to have created the Priory of Sion in 1956.
Critics accuse Brown of distorting and fabricating history. For example,
theological
Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...
author Marcia Ford wrote:
Richard Abanes
Richard Abanes (; born October 13, 1961) is an American writer and actor. As an author/journalist, Abanes specializes in the area of socio-religious issues, cults, the occult, world religions, the entertainment industry, and pop culture. Since 199 ...
wrote:
The book opens with the claim by Dan Brown that "The Priory of Sion—a French
secret society
A secret society is a club or an organization whose activities, events, inner functioning, or membership are concealed. The society may or may not attempt to conceal its existence. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence a ...
founded in 1099—is a real organization". This assertion is broadly disputed; the
Priory of Sion is generally regarded as a hoax created in 1956 by
Pierre Plantard. The author also claims that "all descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents… and secret rituals in this novel are accurate", but this claim is disputed by numerous academic scholars and experts in numerous areas.
Dan Brown himself addresses the idea of some of the more controversial aspects being fact on his website, stating that the "FACT" page at the beginning of the novel mentions only "documents, rituals, organization, artwork and architecture", but not any of the ancient theories discussed by fictional characters, stating that "Interpreting those ideas is left to the reader". Brown also says, "It is my belief that some of the theories discussed by these characters may have merit" and "the secret behind ''The Da Vinci Code'' was too well documented and significant for me to dismiss."
In 2003, while promoting the novel, Brown was asked in interviews what parts of the history in his novel actually happened. He replied "Absolutely all of it." In a 2003 interview with CNN's
Martin Savidge
Martin "The Savage" Savidge (born May 27, 1958) is a Canadian-American television news correspondent.
Savidge worked for NBC News and was a special correspondent and former anchor for public television's '' Worldfocus'' nightly news program in t ...
he was again asked how much of the historical background was true. He replied, "99% is true… the background is all true".
Asked by
Elizabeth Vargas in an
ABC News
ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...
special if the book would have been different if he had written it as non-fiction he replied, "I don't think it would have."
In 2005, UK TV personality
Tony Robinson edited and narrated a detailed rebuttal of the main arguments of Dan Brown and those of
Michael Baigent,
Richard Leigh and
Henry Lincoln
Henry Soskin (12 February 1930 – 23 February 2022), better known as Henry Lincoln, was a British author, television presenter, scriptwriter, and actor. He co-wrote three '' Doctor Who'' multi-part serials in the 1960s, and — starting in t ...
, who authored the book ''
Holy Blood, Holy Grail
''The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail'' (published as ''Holy Blood, Holy Grail'' in the United States) is a book by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln.
The book was first published in 1982 by Jonathan Cape in London as an unoffici ...
'', in the program ''The Real Da Vinci Code'', shown on
British TV
Regular television broadcasts in the United Kingdom started in 1936 as a public service which was free of advertising, which followed the first demonstration of a transmitted moving image in 1926. Currently, the United Kingdom has a collection ...
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...
. The program featured lengthy interviews with many of the main protagonists cited by Brown as "absolute fact" in ''The Da Vinci Code''.
Arnaud de Sède, son of
Gérard de Sède, stated categorically that his father and Plantard had made up the existence of the
Prieuré de Sion, the cornerstone of the
Jesus bloodline
The Jesus bloodline refers to the proposition that a lineal sequence of descendants of the historical Jesus has persisted to the present time. The claims frequently depict Jesus as married, often to Mary Magdalene, and as having descendants living ...
theory: "frankly, it was piffle", noting that the concept of a descendant of Jesus was also an element of the 1999
Kevin Smith film ''
Dogma
Dogma is a belief or set of beliefs that is accepted by the members of a group without being questioned or doubted. It may be in the form of an official system of principles or doctrines of a religion, such as Roman Catholicism, Judaism, Islam ...
''.
The earliest appearance of this theory is due to the 13th-century
Cistercian
The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...
monk and chronicler
Peter of Vaux de Cernay Peter of Vaux de Cernay (died c.1218) was a Cistercian monk of Vaux-de-Cernay Abbey, in what is now Yvelines, northern France, and a chronicler of the Albigensian Crusade. His ''Historia Albigensis'' is one of the primary sources for the events of t ...
who reported that
Cathars believed that the 'evil' and 'earthly' Jesus Christ had a relationship with Mary Magdalene, described as his
concubine
Concubinage is an interpersonal and sexual relationship between a man and a woman in which the couple does not want, or cannot enter into a full marriage. Concubinage and marriage are often regarded as similar but mutually exclusive.
Concubi ...
(and that the 'good Christ' was incorporeal and existed spiritually in the body of Paul). The program ''The Real Da Vinci Code'' also cast doubt on the Rosslyn Chapel association with the Grail and on other related stories, such as the alleged landing of Mary Magdalene in France.
According to ''The Da Vinci Code'', the Roman Emperor
Constantine I
Constantine I ( , ; la, Flavius Valerius Constantinus, ; ; 27 February 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337, the first one to Constantine the Great and Christianity, convert to Christiani ...
suppressed
Gnosticism
Gnosticism (from grc, γνωστικός, gnōstikós, , 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems which coalesced in the late 1st century AD among Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people ...
because it portrayed Jesus as purely human. The novel's argument is as follows: Constantine wanted Christianity to act as a unifying religion for the
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...
. He thought Christianity would appeal to
pagan
Paganism (from classical Latin ''pāgānus'' "rural", "rustic", later "civilian") is a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who practiced polytheism, or ethnic religions other than Judaism. ...
s only if it featured a
demigod similar to pagan heroes. According to the
Gnostic Gospels
The Nag Hammadi library (also known as the " Chenoboskion Manuscripts" and the "Gnostic Gospels") is a collection of early Christian and Gnostic texts discovered near the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi in 1945.
Thirteen leather-bound papyrus ...
, Jesus was merely a human prophet, not a demigod. Therefore, to change Jesus' image, Constantine destroyed the Gnostic Gospels and promoted the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, which portray Jesus as divine or semi-divine.
But Gnosticism did not portray Jesus as merely human.
[.] All Gnostic writings depict Christ as purely divine, his human body being a mere illusion (see
Docetism
In the history of Christianity, docetism (from the grc-koi, δοκεῖν/δόκησις ''dokeĩn'' "to seem", ''dókēsis'' "apparition, phantom") is the heterodox doctrine that the phenomenon of Jesus, his historical and bodily existence, an ...
). Gnostic sects saw Christ this way because they regarded matter as evil, and therefore believed that a divine spirit would never have taken on a material body.
Literary criticism
The book received both positive and negative reviews from critics, and it has been the subject of negative appraisals concerning its portrayal of history. Its writing and historical accuracy were reviewed negatively by ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'',
[Lane, Anthony (May 29, 2006)]
"Heaven Can Wait"
. ''The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
''. Salon.com
''Salon'' is an American politically progressive/liberal news and opinion website created in 1995. It publishes articles on U.S. politics, culture, and current events.
Content and coverage
''Salon'' covers a variety of topics, including re ...
, and ''
Maclean's
''Maclean's'', founded in 1905, is a Canadian news magazine reporting on Canadian issues such as politics, pop culture, and current events. Its founder, publisher John Bayne Maclean, established the magazine to provide a uniquely Canadian perspe ...
''.
Janet Maslin
Janet R. Maslin (born August 12, 1949) is an American journalist, best known as a film and literary critic for ''The New York Times''. She served as a ''Times'' film critic from 1977 to 1999 and as a book critic from 2000 to 2015. In 2000 Maslin ...
of ''The New York Times'' said that one word "concisely conveys the kind of extreme enthusiasm with which this riddle-filled, code-breaking, exhilaratingly brainy thriller can be recommended. That word is wow. The author is Dan Brown (a name you will want to remember). In this gleefully erudite suspense novel, Mr. Brown takes the format he has been developing through three earlier novels and fine-tunes it to blockbuster perfection."
David Lazarus of ''
The San Francisco Chronicle
The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young. The pa ...
'' said, "This story has so many twists—all satisfying, most unexpected—that it would be a sin to reveal too much of the plot in advance. Let's just say that if this novel doesn't get your pulse racing, you need to check your meds."
While interviewing
Umberto Eco in a 2008 issue of ''
The Paris Review
''The Paris Review'' is a quarterly English-language literary magazine established in Paris in 1953 by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton. In its first five years, ''The Paris Review'' published works by Jack Kerouac, Philip ...
'',
Lila Azam Zanganeh
Lila Azam Zanganeh is a writer raised in Paris, France, by exiled Iranian parents. She lives and works in New York City. She is the author of ''The Enchanter: Nabokov and Happiness'' (Penguin Books, 2011). She was a member of the jury for the 2017 ...
characterized ''The Da Vinci Code'' as "a bizarre little offshoot" of Eco's novel, ''
Foucault's Pendulum
''Foucault's Pendulum'' (original title: ''Il pendolo di Foucault'' ) is a novel by Italian writer and philosopher Umberto Eco. It was first published in 1988, and an English translation by William Weaver appeared a year later.
''Foucault's P ...
''. In response, Eco remarked, "Dan Brown is a character from ''Foucault's Pendulum!'' I invented him. He shares my characters' fascinations—the world conspiracy of
Rosicrucians
Rosicrucianism is a spiritual and cultural movement that arose in Europe in the early 17th century after the publication of several texts purported to announce the existence of a hitherto unknown esoteric order to the world and made seeking its ...
,
Masons
Mason may refer to:
Occupations
* Mason, brick mason, or bricklayer, a craftsman who lays bricks to construct brickwork, or who lays any combination of stones, bricks, cinder blocks, or similar pieces
* Stone mason, a craftsman in the stone-cutt ...
, and
Jesuits
The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
. The role of the Knights Templar. The
hermetic secret. The principle that everything is connected. I suspect Dan Brown might not even exist."
The book appeared at number 43 on a 2010 list of 101 best books ever written, which was derived from a survey of more than 15,000 Australian readers.
Salman Rushdie
Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie (; born 19 June 1947) is an Indian-born British-American novelist. His work often combines magic realism with historical fiction and primarily deals with connections, disruptions, and migrations between Eastern and Wes ...
said during a lecture, "Do not start me on ''The Da Vinci Code''. A novel so bad that it gives bad novels a bad name."
Stephen Fry has referred to Brown's writings as "complete loose stool-water" and "arse gravy of the worst kind". In a live chat on June 14, 2006, he clarified, "I just loathe all those book
about the
Holy Grail
The Holy Grail (french: Saint Graal, br, Graal Santel, cy, Greal Sanctaidd, kw, Gral) is a treasure that serves as an important motif in Arthurian literature. Various traditions describe the Holy Grail as a cup, dish, or stone with miracul ...
and Masons and Catholic conspiracies and all that botty-dribble. I mean, there's so much more that's interesting and exciting in art and in history. It plays to the worst and laziest in humanity, the desire to think the worst of the past and the desire to feel superior to it in some fatuous way."
Stephen King
Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, crime, science-fiction, and fantasy novels. Described as the "King of Horror", a play on his surname and a reference to his high s ...
likened Dan Brown's work to "Jokes for the John", calling such literature the "intellectual equivalent of
Kraft Macaroni and Cheese
Kraft Dinner (KD) in Canada, Kraft Mac & Cheese in the United States, Australia, and New Zealand, Cheesey Pasta in the United Kingdom and internationally is a nonperishable, packaged macaroni and cheese product. It is made by Kraft Foods Group ...
". ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', while reviewing the movie based on the book, called the book "Dan Brown's best-selling primer on how not to write an English sentence".
''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' reviewer
Anthony Lane refers to it as "unmitigated junk" and decries "the crumbling coarseness of the style".
Linguist
Geoffrey Pullum and others posted several entries critical of Dan Brown's writing, at
Language Log
''Language Log'' is a collaborative language blog maintained by Mark Liberman, a phonetician at the University of Pennsylvania.
Most of the posts focus on language use in the media and in popular culture. Text available through Google Search fr ...
, calling Brown one of the "worst prose stylists in the history of literature" and saying Brown's "writing is not just bad; it is staggeringly, clumsily, thoughtlessly, almost ingeniously bad".
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...
described it as a "potboiler written with little grace and style", although he said it did "supply an intriguing plot".
In his review of the film ''
National Treasure
The idea of national treasure, like national epics and national anthems, is part of the language of romantic nationalism, which arose in the late 18th century and 19th centuries. Nationalism is an ideology that supports the nation as the fundame ...
'', whose plot also involves ancient conspiracies and treasure hunts, he wrote: "I should read a potboiler like ''The Da Vinci Code'' every once in a while, just to remind myself that life is too short to read books like ''The Da Vinci Code''."
Lawsuits
Author
Lewis Perdue alleged that Brown plagiarized from two of his novels, ''The Da Vinci Legacy'', originally published in 1983, and ''Daughter of God'', originally published in 2000. He sought to block distribution of the book and film. However,
Judge George Daniels of the
US District Court in New York ruled against Perdue in 2005, saying that "A reasonable average lay observer would not conclude that ''The Da Vinci Code'' is substantially similar to ''Daughter of God''" and that "Any slightly similar elements are on the level of generalized or otherwise unprotectable ideas." Perdue appealed; the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the original decision, saying Mr. Perdue's arguments were "without merit".
In early 2006, Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh filed suit against Brown's publisher, Random House. They alleged that significant portions of ''The Da Vinci Code'' were plagiarized from ''
The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail'', violating their copyright.
Brown confirmed during the court case that he named the principal Grail expert of his story Leigh Teabing, an anagram of "Baigent Leigh", after the two plaintiffs. In reply to the suggestion that
Henry Lincoln
Henry Soskin (12 February 1930 – 23 February 2022), better known as Henry Lincoln, was a British author, television presenter, scriptwriter, and actor. He co-wrote three '' Doctor Who'' multi-part serials in the 1960s, and — starting in t ...
was also referred to in the book, since he has medical problems resulting in a severe limp, like the character of Leigh Teabing, Brown stated he was unaware of Lincoln's illness and the correspondence was a coincidence.
Since Baigent and Leigh had presented their conclusions as historical research, not as fiction,
Mr Justice Peter Smith, who presided over the trial, deemed that a novelist must be free to use these ideas in a fictional context, and ruled against Baigent and Leigh. Smith also hid
his own secret code in his written judgment, in the form of seemingly random italicized letters in the 71-page document, which apparently spell out a message. Smith indicated he would confirm the code if someone broke it.
After losing before the
High Court on July 12, 2006, Baigent and Leigh appealed to the
Court of Appeal
A court of appeals, also called a court of appeal, appellate court, appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear an appeal of a trial court or other lower tribunal. In much of t ...
, unsuccessfully.
In April 2006 Mikhail Anikin, a Russian scientist and art historian working as a senior researcher at the
Hermitage Museum
The State Hermitage Museum ( rus, Государственный Эрмитаж, r=Gosudarstvennyj Ermitaž, p=ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)ɨj ɪrmʲɪˈtaʂ, links=no) is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It is the list of ...
in St Petersburg, stated the intention to bring a lawsuit against Dan Brown, maintaining that he was the one who coined the phrase used as the book's title and one of the ideas regarding the ''Mona Lisa'' used in its plot. Anikin interprets the ''Mona Lisa'' to be a Christian allegory consisting of two images, one of Jesus Christ that comprises the image's right half, and one of the Virgin Mary that forms its left half. According to Anikin, he expressed this idea to a group of experts from the Museum of Houston during a 1988
René Magritte exhibit at the Hermitage, and when one of the Americans requested permission to pass it along to a friend Anikin granted the request on condition that he be credited in any book using his interpretation. Anikin eventually compiled his research into ''Leonardo da Vinci or Theology on Canvas'', a book published in 2000, but ''The Da Vinci Code'', published three years later, makes no mention of Anikin and instead asserts that the idea in question is a "well-known opinion of a number of scientists."
Brown has been sued twice in U.S. Federal courts by the author Jack Dunn who claims Brown copied a huge part of his book ''The Vatican Boys'' to write ''The Da Vinci Code'' and ''Angels & Demons''. Both lawsuits were not allowed to go to a jury trial. In 2017, in London, another claim was begun against Brown by Jack Dunn who claimed that justice was not served in the U.S. lawsuits.
Possibly the largest reaction occurred in
Kolkata
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...
, India, where a group of around 25 protesters "stormed" Crossword bookstore, pulled copies of the book from the racks, and threw them to the ground. On the same day, a group of 50–60 protesters successfully made the
Oxford Bookstore
The Oxford Bookstore, formerly known as Oxford Bookstore and Stationery Company, is an Indian book store chain established in 1920. It has no connection with Oxford University Press. Its outlets, on prime locations in the high streets of most of ...
on Park Street decide to stop selling the book "until the controversy sparked by the film's release was resolved". Thus in 2006, seven
Indian states
India is a federal union comprising 28 states and 8 union territories, with a total of 36 entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into districts and smaller administrative divisions.
History
Pre-indepen ...
(
Nagaland
Nagaland () is a landlocked state in the northeastern region of India. It is bordered by the Indian states of Arunachal Pradesh to the north, Assam to the west, Manipur to the south and the Sagaing Region of Myanmar to the east. Its capital cit ...
,
Punjab
Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...
,
Goa
Goa () is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is located between the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to the ...
,
Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a States and union territories of India, state in southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of India ...
,
Andhra Pradesh
Andhra Pradesh (, abbr. AP) is a state in the south-eastern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state by area covering an area of and tenth-most populous state with 49,386,799 inhabitants. It is bordered by Telangana to the ...
) banned the release or exhibition of the
Hollywood
Hollywood usually refers to:
* Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California
* Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States
Hollywood may also refer to:
Places United States
* Hollywood District (disambiguation)
* Hollywood, ...
movie ''
The Da Vinci Code'' (as well as the book). Later, two states, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, lifted the ban under high court order.
Release details
The book has been translated into over 44 languages, primarily hardcover. Major English-language (hardcover) editions include:
* .
* (as of January 2006, has sold 576,000 copies).
* .
* .
* .
* , 5 million copies.
* , released 200,000 copies.
* , the day of the film's release. Including film stills, behind-the-scenes photos and the full script. 25,000 copies of the hardcover, and 200,000 of the paperback version.
Film
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...
adapted the novel to film, with a screenplay written by
Akiva Goldsman
Akiva J. Goldsman (born July 7, 1962) is an American filmmaker. He is known for making motion pictures and adaptations of popular novels.
Goldsman's filmography as a screenwriter includes ''The Client''; ''Batman Forever'' and its sequel '' Ba ...
, and
Academy Award
The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
winner
Ron Howard
Ronald William Howard (born March 1, 1954) is an American director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. He first came to prominence as a child actor, guest-starring in several television series, including an episode of ''The Twilight Zone''. He ...
directing. The film was released on May 19, 2006, and stars
Tom Hanks
Thomas Jeffrey Hanks (born July 9, 1956) is an American actor and filmmaker. Known for both his comedic and dramatic roles, he is one of the most popular and recognizable film stars worldwide, and is regarded as an American cultural icon. Ha ...
as
Robert Langdon
Professor Robert Langdon is a fictional character created by author Dan Brown for his ''Robert Langdon'' book series: ''Angels & Demons'' (2000), ''The Da Vinci Code'' (2003), ''The Lost Symbol'' (2009), ''Inferno'' (2013) and ''Origin'' (2017 ...
,
Audrey Tautou
Audrey Justine Tautou (; born 9 August 1976) is a French actress. She made her acting debut at the age of 18 on television and her feature film debut in ''Venus Beauty Institute'' (1999), for which she received critical acclaim and won the Césa ...
as Sophie Neveu, and Sir
Ian McKellen
Sir Ian Murray McKellen (born 25 May 1939) is an English actor. His career spans seven decades, having performed in genres ranging from Shakespearean and modern theatre to popular fantasy and science fiction. Regarded as a British cultural i ...
as Sir Leigh Teabing. During its opening weekend, moviegoers spent an estimated $77 million in America, and $224 million worldwide.
The movie received mixed reviews. Roger Ebert in its review wrote that "Ron Howard is a better filmmaker than Dan Brown is a novelist; he follows Brown's formula (exotic location, startling revelation, desperate chase scene, repeat as needed) and elevates it into a superior entertainment, with Tom Hanks as a theo-intellectual Indiana Jones... it's involving, intriguing and constantly seems on the edge of startling revelations."
The film received two sequels: ''
Angels & Demons
''Angels & Demons'' is a 2000 bestselling mystery- thriller novel written by American author Dan Brown and published by Pocket Books and then by Corgi Books. The novel introduces the character Robert Langdon, who recurs as the protagonist of Bro ...
'', released in 2009, and
''Inferno'', released in 2016. Ron Howard returned to direct both sequels.
See also
*
Bible conspiracy theory
*
Christian feminism
*
Constantinian shift
*
Desposyni
The brothers of Jesus or the adelphoi ( grc-gre, ἀδελφοί, adelphoí, of the same womb)Greek singular noun ''adelphos'', from a- ("same", equivalent to homo-) and delphys ("womb," equivalent to splanchna). are named in the New Testament a ...
*
False title
*
List of best-selling books
*
Smithy code
The Smithy code is a series of letters embedded, as a private amusement, within the April 2006 approved judgement of Peter Smith (judge), Mr Justice Peter Smith on ''The Da Vinci Code'' copyright case. It was first broken, in the same month, by Da ...
* ''
The Jesus Scroll
''The Jesus Scroll'' is a best-selling book first published in 1972 and written by Australian author Donovan Joyce. A forerunner to some of the ideas later investigated in ''The Da Vinci Code'', Joyce's book made the claim that Jesus of Nazareth ...
''
*
''Mona Lisa'' replicas and reinterpretations
* ''
The Rozabal Line
''The Rozabal Line'' is a thriller fiction novel by Ashwin Sanghi, written under the pseudonym Shawn Haigins, that deals with the story of Jesus having survived the crucifixion and settled down in India. The fictional element is in the same vei ...
''
* ''
The Doomsday Conspiracy''
References
Further reading
* Bock, Darrell L. ''Breaking the da Vinci code: Answers to the questions everyone's asking'' (Thomas Nelson, 2004).
* Ehrman, Bart D. ''Truth and fiction in The Da Vinci Code: a historian reveals what we really know about Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Constantine'' (Oxford University Press, 2004).
* Easley, Michael J., and John Ankerberg. ''The Da Vinci Code Controversy: 10 Facts You Should Know'' (Moody Publishers, 2006).
* Gale, Cengage Learning. ''A Study Guide for Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code'' (Gale, Cengage Learning, 2015).
* Hawel, Zeineb Sami. "Did Dan Brown Break or Repair the Taboos in the Da Vinci Code? An Analytical Study of His Dialectical Style." ''International Journal of Linguistics and Literature'' (IJLL) 7.4: 5-24
online* Kennedy, Tammie M. "Mary Magdalene and the Politics of Public Memory: Interrogating" The Da Vinci Code"." ''Feminist Formations'' (2012): 120-139
online* Mexal, Stephen J. "Realism, Narrative History, and the Production of the Bestseller: The Da Vinci Code and the Virtual Public Sphere." ''Journal of Popular Culture'' 44.5 (2011): 1085–1101
online* Newheiser, Anna-Kaisa, Miguel Farias, and Nicole Tausch. "The functional nature of conspiracy beliefs: Examining the underpinnings of belief in the Da Vinci Code conspiracy." ''Personality and Individual Differences'' 51.8 (2011): 1007–1011
online* Olson, Carl E., and Sandra Miesel. ''The da Vinci hoax: Exposing the errors in The da Vinci code'' (Ignatius Press, 2004).
* Propp, William H. C. "Is The Da Vinci Code True?." ''Journal of Religion and Popular Culture'' 25.1 (2013): 34–48.
*
Pullum, Geoffrey K.The Dan Brown code" (2004)
* Schneider-Mayerson, Matthew. "The Dan Brown phenomenon: conspiracism in post-9/11 popular fiction." ''Radical History Review'' 2011.111 (2011): 194–201
online* Walsh, Richard G. "Passover Plots: From Modern Fictions to Mark and Back Again." ''Postscripts: The Journal of Sacred Texts, Cultural Histories, and Contemporary Contexts'' 3.2-3 (2007): 201–222
online
External links
*
*
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Da Vinci Code, The
2003 American novels
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Novels about cryptography
Holy Grail in fiction
Novels about museums
Novels by Dan Brown
Opus Dei
Sequel novels
Novels involved in plagiarism controversies
Doubleday (publisher) books
Anti-Catholic publications
Mona Lisa
American novels adapted into films
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Denial of the crucifixion of Jesus
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