Leonardo returned to the subject years later, in the wake of a commission to paint a huge battle scene in the Palazzo della Signoria in Florence. In preparation for the project he executed many drawings of male musculature, some so detailed that they can only have been based on flayed bodies. Leonardo was then in his fifties and one of the most celebrated artists in Italy; at this point in his career, he seems to have had little difficulty in obtaining permission to dissect human corpses.