The New Student's Reference Work/Bruno, Giordano

Bru'no, Giordano, an Italian philosopher who lived during the last half of the 16th century. Concerning his parents and the date of his birth almost nothing is known. His life was spent largely in lecturing in many of the principal cities of western Europe, including Padua, Geneva, Paris, London, Oxford, Wittenberg, Prague. His chief service lies in the energetic and successful war which he waged against the scholasticism of his times, and in particular against the lifeless physics of Aristotle.

A contemporary of Tycho Brahe and Kepler, he expanded the system of Copernicus and prepared the way for Galileo. Even from these few lines, it will be evident that he was just the type of man which the Inquisition was looking for. At the hands of this institution he received the verdict of "guilty," in February of 1600. Punishment was prescribed in the following customary hypocritical sentence: Ut quam clementissime, et citra sanguinis effusionem puniretur, "to be punished with the utmost clemency and without shedding of blood." He was accordingly burned at the stake in Rome on the 17th of February, 1600.