The Vietri Codices

Studying heavy flavour physics is driven by multiple motivations: to probe our theoretical control over QCD; enhance our information on gluon and sea quark structure functions; use heavy flavour production as signal for the onset of the quark-gluon plasma; revisit light flavour spectroscopy through the final states in heavy flavour decays; extract fundamental quantities like CKM and MNS parameters; search for new Physics. The last two years have witnessed tremendous amplification in our knowledge of heavy flavour dynamics. We know the elements of the CKM matrix with significantly improved reliability; a new door has been opened by the observation of K^+ --> pi^+ nu nu-bar; with direct CP violation being established in K_L decays and the expected huge CP asymmetry been observed in B_d(t) --> psi K_S the CKM description has attained the level of a tested theory of CP violation. Yet more than ever the Standard Model is viewed as incomplete: apart from the peculiar pattern in mass related parameters of the fundamental fermions there is more direct evidence in the signals for neutrino oscillations, the strong CP problem and the baryon number of the universe. A worldwide, interrelated and comprehensive program has been developed for heavy quark and lepton physics that will provide essential impetus towards a deeper understanding of nature's grand design.