In the biographies that I have read on line it says that he was born and educated in Pisa. And that he had three children born out of wedlock. Also that he was reluctant to get married because of financial considerations and his own social standing.
Was he considered to be what we would now consider to be a poor student from a middle class or aristocratic family like in "La Boheme"?
Being educated at all was not the same then as it is today. Today, primary and extended education is subsidized by the federal, state and city governments. Then it might have been subsidized by the church. Either way it is expensive and would have had to be subsidized.
Did the University at Pisa have the same prestige then as it does now? I find it interesting that Galileo was born and educated in Pisa as travel would have been more expensive then than now due to improvements in technology.
I'm sorry that that's more than one question. I'm interested in the details of the transition from religious power to secular power in Western Europe. So other references are welcome.
Gelileo's background was pretty normal, possibly definable as lower-middle-class. Although his mother and father grew up in well-to-do bourgeois environments, his father's profession as lute player and musical composer didn't really bring in all that much money. Galileo's father was nonetheless discreetly successful, publishing a number of books on music theory, but records also show he also rounded his income by providing music lessons and partook in some sort of undefined commercial activity (if I'd have to guess, I'd say the sale of printed sheet music or musical instruments, although I don't think specific records have been found). So although Galileo's family were better educated and better off than most people, their lives weren't particularly luxurious.
Galileo's was undoubtably a bright young man, but he wasn't a perfect student and missed out on a sort of scholarship program at the University of Pisa. A family friend with a stable income as a customs official agreed to support him during his university studies; an indication that although Galileo's family recognized the importance of education, they weren't exactly rolling in dough. Galileo's prior education was also fairly standard for someone of his background, and although there wouldn't be a public education system in Tuscany for another several hundred years there were nonetheless numerous educational options in the sixteenth century: the young Galileo was educated at a variety of religious schools in Tuscany.
The choice of the University of Pisa, although almost certainly undertaken for its proximity to the Galilei home, also had a clear financial motivation: Galileo's initial track was medicine, a lucrative career then as now. But when, in the mid 1580s, Galileo found himself increasingly drawn to mathematics, he moved for a while to the University of Florence, where the presence of the Grand Duchy's court and courtiers provided a wider network of patrons interested in financing research in fields without immediate practical applications. Here too life was far from plush, and Galileo sustained himself by offering private lessons in mathematics while applying for university posts, resulting in a notable rejection from the University of Bologna. Galileo had to network extensively in order to obtain his first post; in spite of personal dislike by some members of the government, his passion, talent, and intelligence (as well as luck!) earned him a three-year contract at the University of Pisa.
Galileo had a difficult personality; biographers have attributed his refusal to marry his partner Marina Gamba as more of a consequence of his own preference than anything else, although there might have also been a financial consideration to boot (having to pay a dowry to get his daughters married and whatnot). His own social standing, a university professor who regularly hobnobbed with influential patrons of the arts and sciences, might have made it easier for him to ignore his lower-class con-vivant and daughters born out of wedlock. However, Galileo probably legitimately didn't have the money to pay for his daughter's dowries, and did personally intervene in order to have them placed in a prestigious convent.