[meteorite-list] Comet hit Britain in mid sixth century, AD?

From: bernd.pauli_at_paulinet.de <bernd.pauli_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sat Jul 22 15:14:06 2006
Message-ID: <DIIE.000000280000090C_at_paulinet.de>

"One ancient Khumric record, the Brut Tyssilio, speaks of, 'a star of great
magnitude and brilliance with a single beam shining from it. At the end of
this beam was a ball of fire, spread out in the shape of a dragon'..."

Hello List,

Maybe no comet really hit Britain in mid 6th century and we are dealing
with folklore and legend. I don't know if anyone has already mentioned
the return of Halley's comet in 530 (perihelion: September 27).Byzantene
sources say Halley's return was followed by "drought and mortality". On
April 9 of the same year, people witnessed a very impressive meteor
shower (almost a meteor storm!). Here's an excerpt from a Chinese report:

"Very luminous meteor trails followed each other in a northwesterly
direction. The number of the trails which appeared incessantly, was
in the thousands."

This was a very spectacular shower of the Eta-Aquarids because
Earth had entered the central part of Halley's "dust cloud".

The late Fred L. Wipple writes on page 52 of his book "The Mystery Of
Comets" (Cambridge University, 1985) about *this* return of Halley's
Comet:

"The Chinese found it in the morning sky on August 29 and saw it
reappear in the evening of September 4; it finally disappeared on
September 27."

And now it's getting even more interesting:

"Merlin, the wizard of King Arthur's Court, is said to have based
prophesies on the comet."

So, maybe folklore + a real event in the sky combined to foment this
comet strike theory???

Cheers,

Bernd
Received on Sat 22 Jul 2006 03:13:07 PM PDT