Richard Leigh, the author who unsuccessfully tried to sue writer Dan Brown for plagiarism over The Da Vinci Code, has died aged 64.

The alternative history writer co-wrote Holy Blood, Holy Grail, a non-fiction book that speculated that Jesus Christ had fathered a child with Mary Magdalene.

It was a bestseller when it was released in the 1980s and enjoyed a new surge of interest when Brown's similarly-themed novel was released four years ago.

Leigh, along with one of the co-authors Michael Baigent, sued Brown's publisher Random House and claimed that The Da Vinci Code "appropriated the architecture" of their book. The third co-author did not go ahead with the lawsuit.

In April last year the claim was thrown out by high court judge Peter Smith, who said Leigh's book was too general to be protected by copyright laws.

Leigh and Baigent were ordered to pay around 85% of Random House's legal costs, which amounted to around £3 million.

Of the verdict Leigh said: "We lost on the letter of the law. I think we won on the spirit of the law, to that extent we feel vindicated."

An appeal to overturn the ruling was rejected earlier this year.

Leigh published a number of fiction stories and non-fiction historical books during his life. His funeral was held on Wednesday.