Since its inception the idea of a monument dedicated to the executed heretic located in Rome, once the capital of the Papal States, has generated controversy between anti-clerical and those more aligned with the Roman Catholic church.

The inscription on the base recites: A BRUNO - IL SECOLO DA LUI DIVINATO - QUI DOVE IL ROGO ARSE (English: To Bruno - The Age he Predicted (erected this monument) - Here Where the Stake Burned) Along the top of the plinth are eight medallions with bust reliefs; they depict the Venetian Paolo Sarpi, the Calabrian Tommaso Campanella, the French Petrus Ramus, the Roman Lucilio Vanini, the Italian Aonio Paleario; the Spaniard Michele Serveto, the English John Wycliffe, and the Bohemian Jan Hus.

The statue was unveiled on 9 June 1889, at the site where Bruno was burnt at the stake for heresy on 17 February 1600, and the radical politician Giovanni Bovio gave a speech surrounded by about 100 Masonic flags.

Since thousands of individuals and students aligned with anticlerical movements had congregated in Rome for the unveiling, the Vatican had closed the museum and warned local churches and parishes to shutter their doors to avoid confrontations or incidents from what they considered an atheistic mob.

[12][13] A statue of a stretched human figure standing on its head designed by Alexander Polzin depicting Bruno's death at the stake was placed in Potsdamer Platz station in Berlin, Germany, on March 2, 2008.