Hanging with Bruno
Giordano Bruno was an Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, mathematician, poet, and cosmological theorist who was burned at the stake after being tried and found guilty of heresy by the Roman Inquisitions in 1600. A supporter of Copernican ideas, he took them further and proposed that stars are just distant suns possibly surrounded by their own planets and even suggested the possibility life on them. He also insisted that the universe is in fact infinite and could have no celestial body at its center.
Bruno is celebrated as a landmark figure in the struggle for free thought and science.
Romans raise money by subscription to erect this tribute to him.