Bruno himself supplied no captions to his illustrations in La cena delle ceneri, which are mostly diagrammatic. It is thought that he prepared the woodcuts himself, possibly for economic reasons. They are often of poor quality, and may have been prepared when he no longer had his text in front of him, as the letters in the diagrams often fail to correspond to those indicated in the text itself. The brief descriptions offered here are the editor’s interpretations of what he writes about them in his text.
Introduction
Fig. I From La cena de le ceneri, Dialogue IV: Bruno’s drawing of the Ptolemaic system facing the Copernican system on the same page includes his correction to Torquatus’s representation of the Copernican system
Fig. II Diagram of the universe in Copernicus, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, Liber I
Fig. III Diagram of the geometrical co-ordinates of the inclination of the earth’s axis as it moves around the sun according to Copernicus, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, Liber I
Fig. IV From La cena de le ceneri, Dialogue V: diagram of the multiple movements of a spinning ball thrown up into the air
Fig. V Bruno’s version in his Latin De maximo et innumerabilibus, Liber III, of Copernicus’s diagram in fig. III
La cena de le ceneri / The Ash Wednesday Supper
Dialogue III
Fig. 1 Diagram representing the “eye” of an observer moving into space beyond the globe of the earth. As the angle of vision decreases, larger and larger portions of the earth’s horizon become visible
Fig. 2 Diagram showing that the luminous sphere of the sun must be larger than the opaque sphere of earth because the earth produces a finite cone of shadow
Fig. 3 Diagram claiming to show (erroneously) how a small luminous body moving away from a large opaque sphere will illuminate it at a great distance even beyond its diameter until a point is reached where the opaque body will no longer impede the vision of another luminous body placed on the opposite side
Fig. 4 Diagram related to the previous figures showing how the eye of an observer moving away from the centre of the earth will see its diameter at an ever more acute angle until the angle becomes a straight line and the earth becomes a mere point and finally disappears
Fig. 5 Diagram of the earth’s globe designed to show how even the highest mountains fail to impede vision of the horizon as a hemisphere
Fig. 6 Diagram of a moving ship in relation to a distant shore designed to illustrate Bruno’s sense of the relativity of motion on a moving earth
Dialogue IV
Fig. 7 Bruno’s drawing of the Ptolemaic system facing the Copernican system on the same page includes his correction to Torquatus’s representation of the Copernican system
Dialogue V
Fig. 8 Diagram designed to show how the “fixed stars” are not really fixed either in relation to an observer on earth or in relation to each other, but only appear fixed due to the great distances involved
Fig. 9 Diagram of the co-ordinates of the movements of a spinning ball thrown vertically into the air