Bruno and Campanella : Civilization, Religion, Nihilism center dot Bruno and Campa-nella shared a few characteristic propositions that belonged to the domain of philosophy of history. In this article, their positions are compared by focusing on the theme of the value crisis that was deemed to affect societies at the time. Both philosophers, albeit moving from different points of view, considered this crisis as originating from the very core of Christian faith. Between the second half of the sixteenth century and the first decades of the seventeenth, a diffused perception that traditional values were under siege was not limited to Christian religion, but it affected the very civilization expressed by it. This was taking place at a time when the founding categories of modernity were being defined - in science and in other fields - in the wake of Christianity. Received Christian views concerning nature as a whole and the status of human beings as rational agents detached from the sphere of natural and animal agency were increasingly contested. Although Bruno and Campanella developed their reflections following different approaches, in their analyses they both highlighted a crisis of values and the impending threat of nihilism.
