The Venetians: A New History: from Marco Polo to Casanova (42 page)

Further travels followed, and there is a suspicion that at some stage he may have supplemented his meagre income by acting as a spy, passing on rather more mundane ideas than those expressed in his frequent and varied works, which ranged over a variety of exotic and novel topics, including
one on a new memory system that he had invented. 1591 found him attempting to sell his works at the Frankfurt Book Fair.
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Here he was befriended by a Venetian nobleman named Zuan Mocenigo, of the distinguished family who had for centuries been providing the city with admirals, diplomats and doges. Mocenigo was deeply interested in Bruno’s new system for improving the memory, and invited him to come and stay at his palazzo in Venice so that he could personally tutor him in how to use this system. By now Bruno was forty-three years old: he was beginning to tire of his continual travelling and longed to return to his native Italy. Surely his troubles with the Church would have been forgotten? Anyway, he would be quite safe in Venice. Furthermore, he had heard that the chair in mathematics had fallen vacant at Padua. Bruno prevaricated over Mocenigo’s offer, indicating that he would travel first to Padua, where he arrived in the late summer of 1591. He foresaw himself using Padua as a base where he would be free to propagate his theories and at the same time deliver lectures incorporating his constant flow of original ideas, attracting students and acolytes from all over Europe. However, it soon became clear to Bruno that he was not going to be offered a post at Padua, so he travelled on to Venice to take up Mocenigo’s offer. Mocenigo immediately put him up at the family palazzo, one of the finest in Venice, the Ca’ Grande on the Grand Canal. The intellectuals of Venice were delighted to discover that this major European thinker had come to live in their midst, and they flocked to the Ca’ Grande to discover his latest ideas.

Over the years these had developed, but they remained as original and controversial as ever. As indeed they remain to this day. In the scientific sphere he adopted a strictly materialistic approach: he now proposed that everything in the world was made up of tiny indestructible atoms, of different shapes and sizes to account for the variety of material objects. Yet at the same time he persisted in his utterly contradictory magical-mystical ideas. It is difficult to see how Bruno could possibly have believed genuinely in both of these world-views at the same time. Here was a man
who seemed to stand with one foot firmly planted in the medieval world of the past (and remnant hermetic ideas from even earlier), while the other stood firmly in the Renaissance world and the enlightened scientific future that it seemed to be heralding. Bruno was well aware of this glaring contradiction, yet he maintained that in some inexplicable way his occult beliefs and his genuine science had a ‘point of union’. Perhaps the best illustration of this – even if it is in no way a convincing explanation – is to be found in his ideas about the solar system. Bruno was convinced that the Earth and the planets revolved around the sun, yet at the same time he also believed that the solar system was a mystical-magical symbol of the cosmos.

Such ideas inevitably became the talk of intellectual Venice. However, Mocenigo soon began to grow jealous of all the brilliant men who called at his palazzo, but were only interested in talking with Bruno. It appears that Mocenigo was no giant of an intellect, but he had his pretentions, and he had been hoping that Bruno’s memory system might gain him entree into the intellectual circles of Venice. At any rate, from the outset Mocenigo found difficulty in mastering even the basic principles of Bruno’s memory system. This he blamed on his teacher. Relations between the resentful aristocrat and his arrogant tutor soon began to deteriorate, to the point where Bruno informed his host that he had decided to break off his teaching and return to Frankfurt to publish a new book that he had written. Outraged at Bruno’s perceived ingratitude, Mocenigo accused him of being a charlatan, claiming that his so-called memory system, which he found impossible to comprehend, was nothing more than a fraud. Mocenigo was determined not to let Bruno leave Venice and reported him to the city’s Inquisition for holding heretical views.

Bruno was now put on trial, and proceeded to defend himself against the none-too-pressing questions of his inquisitors. It appeared that he would probably escape with a reprimand and be allowed to go on his way. Although Bruno had travelled the courts of Europe and in the course of this must have encountered many of the finest portraitists, there are in fact no surviving portraits of him. The only descriptions we have stem from his trial in Venice. Like the man and his ideas, these are appropriately incompatible. The clerk of the court described him as middle-aged, of
medium build, with a chestnut-coloured beard. On the other hand, a local bookseller called Ciotto who was summoned as a witness described him as short and thin, with a black beard. Many remarked on how Bruno spoke with great speed and flamboyant gestures, in the manner of southern Italians; others, who had attended his lectures, emphasised his earnest and deliberate manner of speech, which was accompanied by such concentration as to make him appear absent-minded, unselfconscious and oblivious to all but what he was saying.

Either way, Bruno adopted a prudent tactical approach to his trial, which was conducted in the Hall of the Council of Ten in the Doge’s Palace. Right from the start Bruno decided to concede that in the course of his teaching he had perhaps committed certain minor doctrinal errors. Yet these were all concerned with his scientific ideas, and thus could surely not be seen as serious theological errors. Apart from this, he believed utterly in the message of Christ and in no way contradicted the teachings of the Church. This was an undeniably disingenuous approach, prompted perhaps by his characteristic arrogance. The ‘minor errors’ that he appeared so willing to recant were nothing less than his original scientific ideas – his heliocentric theory, the infinity of solar systems in the universe, and atomism. Likewise, where his religious beliefs were concerned, he chose to overlook his belief in the dark arts of alchemy, hermeticism and magic, all of which were based on utterly heretical beliefs. However, Bruno was convinced that the Venetian Inquisition was not deeply concerned and was merely going through the motions.

And such would probably have been the case. But word soon came through that the Roman Inquisition had been informed of Bruno’s trial, and they insisted that the Venetians despatch their prisoner to them at once. This was a much more serious matter. The Roman Inquisition was a powerful force in the Counter-Reformation, which had been launched almost half a century previously to combat the influence of Protestantism and exterminate any other unorthodox religious ideas. On top of this, Bruno still had charges of heresy to face, dating from sixteen years previously when he had fled from his monastery in Naples – meanwhile his cause had hardly been assisted by his travels about Europe attempting to convert Catholics and Protestants alike to his scientific and metaphysical ideas.

There is evidence that it was Mocenigo who tipped off the Roman Inquisition about Bruno’s trial in Venice. Indeed, there is more than a suspicion that Mocenigo had been playing an extremely devious role from the outset of his relationship with Bruno. Mocenigo made no secret of the fact that he had links with the Venetian Inquisition – with his family connections it is unlikely to have been otherwise. Less evident was the fact that he also had connections with some members of the Roman Inquisition. In the opinion of his biographer, Michael White, ‘It was these men who encouraged Mocenigo to forge a relationship with Bruno with the deliberate intention of trapping the philosopher.’

Initially, it seems, the Venetian Inquisition was reluctant to surrender its prisoner to the more vindictive court in Rome. However, pressure was soon brought to bear upon the Republic: Bruno was not even Venetian, and besides he still faced a charge of heresy in Rome. By retaining Bruno in their custody, treating him leniently and perhaps even letting him escape back across the Alps, Venice would be guilty of a dangerous act of defiance against Rome. The Venetian authorities soon caved in. Here, if needed, was further evidence of Venice’s decline. The Republic was no longer a proud imperial power, with possessions all over the eastern Mediterranean, or even a major ruler over much of northern Italy. Those days were over: Venice was now a marginal provincial power, keen to retain whatever friends it could find in order to protect its independence. The Republic had no wish to make an unnecessary enemy of Rome. In February 1593 Bruno was unceremoniously surrendered to the papal authorities, clapped in irons and transported to Rome. Here he was taken to the notorious dungeons of the Castel Sant’ Angelo, the papal fortress in the Vatican.

Even at this juncture Bruno was not unduly worried. Clement VIII, a man known for his liberal views, had been elected pope in January 1592 and had already given evidence of his broad-mindedness by consulting on matters of doctrine with Francesco Patrizi, an occultist who had published his own ‘new philosophy’, which included both Christian and hermetic ideas. Bruno felt sure that if he could but gain an audience with the pope he would soon be able to persuade him of the validity of his ideas and their effectiveness in combating the attractiveness of the simpler spirituality embraced by the Protestants. But
such meetings were not so easy to arrange. The papal Curia was an intricate balance of opposing hierarchies and power structures, held together by all manner of intricate protocol, which the pope interfered with at his peril. In order to rule effectively, a pope was frequently forced to make compromises with the demands of these disparate elements. In Bruno’s case, the Roman Inquisition made sure that any contact between the pope and Bruno was out of the question – there was to be no repeat of the Patrizi affair.

Bruno was kept in the dungeons and eventually brought to trial. As was often the case in Rome, this dragged on for years, with Bruno becoming increasingly confident that his views would prevail over the objections put forward by prosecutors who were simply no match for his superior intellect. No longer did he admit, as he had in Venice, that he had committed minor errors: boldly he began insisting upon the veracity of all his scientific and hermetic claims. His inquisitors put forward orthodox, but otherwise ineffectual, objections.

By now Clement VIII was becoming increasingly disturbed at the mockery that Bruno appeared to be making of the Inquisition, and consulted on the matter with his senior adviser, Roberto Bellarmino (usually known by his English equivalent Robert Bellarmine). The fifty-seven-year-old Bellarmine was a Jesuit, a man of considerable intellect and strict orthodoxy who had been a professor of theology for some twenty years. Clement VIII soon came to a decision. In 1599 Bruno’s trial was placed in the charge of Bellarmine, who had been appointed a cardinal for the purpose. (Strict protocol had to be observed: as a Jesuit, Bellarmine would not otherwise have been able to preside over a court of the Inquisition, which was an institution of the Dominicans.)

After years of futile bickering, Bruno’s trial now began to move more swiftly. When confronting Cardinal Bellarmine, he hoist himself on his own petard. His self-confident claims for his scientific and hermetic beliefs were quickly demonstrated to be heresy by Bellarmine. Bruno was found guilty and condemned to be burned at the stake. On 19 February 1600, as Bruno was led out towards the unlit pyre of kindling wood in the Campo di Fiore (Field of Flowers), it was noticed by the crowd that his mouth had been stuffed with a gag and his lips bound with a leather
strap.
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There was to be no possibility of him proclaiming his ideas in public before the flames reduced his mind to silence and his body to ashes. The Inquisition was taking no chances: in order to preserve one true faith of the Catholic Church,
all
new ideas had to be silenced.

The man who succeeded in obtaining the chair of mathematics at Padua the year after Bruno had been turned down for the post was Galileo Galilei, who is seen by many as the founder of the modern scientific era. He had been born in Pisa, on the west coast of Tuscany, in February 1564. His father was a highly skilled lutenist, who had in fact studied musical theory in Venice; however, he would never achieve the success he deserved, owing to his rebellious character. Like father, like son. Galileo grew to be a bumptious, self-confident youth, with a shock of flaming red hair, whose obvious extrovert charms concealed a rather more complex temperament. At the age of seventeen he returned to Pisa to study medicine at the university, but soon rebelled against the stale medieval curriculum and began embracing the humanistic Renaissance ideas that were themselves now beginning to emerge from the shadow of classical learning into the light of modern reality. The spirit of originality that in its different ways had inspired Copernicus, and would inspire Bruno and Harvey, was very much in the air. Glaring mistakes were being discovered in the science of Aristotle and Galen; a new science was being born that studied the workings of the world rather than the authority of the ancients.

At the age of twenty-one Galileo left Pisa without having gained a degree, and for the next few years precariously supported himself in Florence and Siena by tutoring – at one point even giving lessons to Cosimo de’ Medici, the young son of Grand Duke Ferdinand II, the ruler of Florence. Whilst in Florence, Galileo came under the influence of the Medici court mathematician Ostilio Ricci, a man of some brilliance, who quickly recognised a fellow spirit and encouraged Galileo to pursue the study of mathematics, a subject that had long fascinated him. Indeed, Galileo soon made such
progress in this field that he managed to obtain the chair in mathematics at his old university in Pisa. According to legend, it was here that he publicly disproved Aristotle’s theory that heavier bodies fall more quickly to the ground than lighter ones, by dropping objects of differing weights from the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa and showing that both reached the ground simultaneously. Whether or not this incident actually took place, its brazenness and scientific intent were characteristic, making Galileo a great favourite with the students, amongst whom he enjoyed the boisterous life of the taverns. Such scandalous behaviour, as well as Galileo’s openly contemptuous regard for his more orthodox academic colleagues, meant that in 1592 his contract was not renewed.