Giordano Bruno was born in 1548 in Nola, Italy. At the age of thirteen he went to school at the Monastery of Saint Domenico, the same school that Thomas Aquinas had lived and taught in. After much hard work, Bruno became a Dominican priest at the school mentioned. His radical opinions, however, were not very keenly looked upon by others and so, trouble plagued his educational career. Bruno ran away from Italy, leaving everything behind, to seek another country where he could be accepted for his thoughts. Bruno was very successful; in 1581 he gave philosophical lectures in Paris. He soon caught the attention of King Henry III, who would become one of Bruno's patrons. Bruno began writing many books, such as The Shadow of Ideas, Art of Memory, Brief Architecture of Lully with its Completion, and a play, "The Chandler". Giordano Bruno's Brief Architecture of Lully with its Completion challenges Christianity, its doctrines and its faith. In the tome he writes that Christianity is an irrational religion, and the only reason people regard it so highly is because they were brainwashed by stories of God and faith, not because of science and proof. Bruno further challenged the Church by claiming that there was an infinite universe, in which God, as was described in the Bible, could not have existed. Bruno did not see himself as a heretic but saw the Bible as a book for the ignorant. Not only did Bruno challenge the Church in his writings, he also challenged the concepts of Aristotle, whose ideas were held in high regard at the time.

Bruno found himself becoming homesick for Italy, after traveling away for fourteen years. When Mocenigo offered Bruno a home in Venice, Bruno accepted. Mocenigo turned Bruno over to the authorities during the Inquisition. He first was held in the Republic of Venice, but then he was surrendered to a Papal prison in Rome. Bruno served eight years in prison before he received his sentence, which was burning at the stake. He was given the opportunity to denounce his ideas, but Bruno refused and was killed.Thus, Giordano Bruno served as a type of martyr for cosmology. His ideas were much too radical and revolutionary for his time. He was the first to propose an infinite universe, and with this assumption, he was not too far off the mark. He pictured the cosmos we live in as something great, too great for mere humans to encompass. His thoughts and ideals served as the foundation for scientific thought and advancement.