Galileo Galilei spent eighteen years in Venice, from 1592 to 1610, which he would later remember as the best years of his life.
During these years, he gained prestige with the Venetian senate, but also with the rectors of the University of Padua, who paid him an ever-increasing, and eventually substantial, salary.
Galileo also frequented the learned circles and senatorial circles of Venice, where he became friends with Paolo Sarpi, philosopher and theologian. It seems that it was Sarpi himself who informed him that early prototypes of telescopes had begun to be produced in Holland.
Enthused, Galileo worked to perfect his invention. He ordered glassmakers in Murano to cast and grind the necessary lenses, producing instruments with 20 or even 30 times magnification, of unprecedented quality compared to those produced in the Netherlands, which had a magnification of about 4 times....