§ 2.89 [22] A few facts about the world remain. There are also stars that suddenly come to birth in the heaven itself; of these there are several kinds. The Greeks call them 'comets,' in our language 'long-haired stars,' because they have a blood-red shock of what looks like shaggy hair at their top. The Greeks also give the name of 'bearded stars' to those from whose lower part spreads a mane resembling a long beard. 'Javelin-stars' quiver like a dart; these are a very terrible portent. To this class belongs the comet about which
Titus Imperator Caesar in his 5th consulship [76 CE] wrote an account in his famous poem, that being its latest appearance down to the present day. The same stars when shorter and sloping to a point have been called 'Daggers'; these are the palest of all in colour, and have a gleam like the flash of a sword, and no rays, which even the Quoit-star, which resembles its name in appearance but is in colour like amber, emits in scattered form from its edge.
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§ 2.90 The 'Tub-star' presents the shape of a cask, with a smoky light all round it. The 'Horned star' has the shape of a horn, like the one that appeared when Greece fought the decisive battle of Salamis. The 'Torch-star' resembles glowing torches, the '
Horse-star
horses' manes in very rapid motion and revolving in a circle. There also occurs a shining comet whose silvery tresses glow so brightly that it is scarcely possible to look at it, and which displays within it a shape in the likeness of a man's countenance. There also occur '
Goat comets,' enringed with a sort of cloud resembling tufts of hair. Once hitherto it has happened that a 'Mane-shaped' comet changed into a spear; this was in the
108th Olympiad [348-345 BCE] , AUC 408 [346 BC]. The shortest period of visibility on record for a comet is 7 days, the longest 80.
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§ 2.91 [23] Some comets move, like the planets, but others are fixed and stationary, almost all of them towards the due North, not in any particular part of it, though chiefly in the luminous region called the Milky Way.
Aristotle also records that several may be seen at the same time — a fact not observed by anyone else, as far as I am aware — and that this signifies severe winds or heat. Comets also occur in the winter months and at the south pole, but comets in the south have no rays. A terrible comet was seen by the people of Ethiopia and Egypt, to which
Typhon the king of that period gave his name; it had a fiery appearance and was twisted like a coil, and it was very grim to behold: it was not really a star so much as what might be called a ball of fire.
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§ 2.92 Planets and all other stars also occasionally have spreading hair. But sometimes there is a comet in the western sky, usually a terrifying star and not easily expiated: for instance, during the civil disorder in the consulship of
Octavius, and again during the war between
Pompey and
Caesar, or in our day about the time of the poisoning which secured the bequest of the empire by
Claudius Caesar to
Domitius Nero, and thereafter during
Nero's principate shining almost continuously and with a terrible glare. People think that it matters in what direction a comet darts, what star's strength it borrows, what shapes it resembles, and in what places it shines;
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§ 2.93 that if it resembles a pair of flutes. It is a portent for the art of music, in the private parts of the constellations it portends immorality, if it forms an equilateral triangle or a rectangular quadrilateral in relation to certain positions of the fixed stars, it portends men of genius and a revival of learning, in the head of the Northern or the Southern Serpent it brings poisonings.
The only place in the whole world where a comet is the object of worship is a temple at Rome. His late Majesty
Augustus had deemed this comet very propitious to himself; as it had appeared at the beginning of his rule, at some games which, not long after the decease of his father
Caesar, as a member of the college founded by him he was celebrating in honour of Mother
Venus.
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§ 2.94 In fact he made public the joy that it gave him in these words: 'On the very days of my Games a comet was visible for seven days in the northern part of the sky. It was rising about an hour before sunset, and was a bright star, visible from all lands. The common people believed that this star signified the soul of
Caesar received among the spirits of the immortal gods, and on this account the emblem of a star was added to the bust of
Caesar that we shortly afterwards dedicated in the forum.' This was his public utterance, but privately he rejoiced because he interpreted the comet as having been born for his own sake and as containing his own birth within it; and, to confess the truth, it did have a health-giving influence over the world.
Some persons think that even comets are everlasting, and travel in a special circuit of their own, but are not visible except when the sun leaves them; there are others, however, who hold that they spring into existence out of chance moisture and fiery force, and consequently are dissolved.
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§ 2.95 [24]
Hipparchus before-mentioned, who can never be sufficiently praised, no one having done more to prove that man is related to the stars and that our souls are a part of heaven, detected a new star that came into existence during his lifetime; the movement of this star in its line of radiance led him to wonder whether this was a frequent occurrence, whether the stars that we think to be fixed are also in motion; and consequently he did a bold thing, that would be reprehensible even for God — he dared to schedule the stars for posterity, and tick off the heavenly bodies by name in a list, devising machinery by means of which to indicate their several positions and magnitudes, in order that from that time onward it might be possible easily to discern not only whether stars perish and are born, but whether some are in transit and in motion, and also whether they increase and decrease in magnitude — thus bequeathing the heavens as a legacy to all mankind, supposing anybody had been found to claim that inheritance!
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§ 2.96 [25] There are also meteoric lights that are only seen when falling, for instance one that ran across the sky at midday in full view of the public when
Germanicus Caesar was giving a gladiatorial show. Of these there are two kinds: one sort are called lampades, which means torches, the other bolides (missiles), — that is the sort that appeared at the time of the disasters of Modena. The difference between them is that 'torches' make long tracks, with their front part glowing, whereas a 'boils' glows throughout its length, and traces a longer path.
[26] Other similar meteoric lights are 'beams.' in Greek dokoi, for example one that appeared when the Spartans were defeated at sea and lost the empire of Greece. There also occurs a yawning of the actual sky, called chasma,
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§ 2.97 [27] and also something that looks like blood, and a fire that falls from it to the earth — the most alarming possible cause of terror to mankind; as happened in the third year [349BC] of the
107th Olympiad, when King
Philip was throwing Greece into disturbance. My own view is that these occurrences take place at fixed dates owing to natural forces, like all other events, and not, as most people think, from the variety of causes invented by the cleverness of human intellects; it is true that they were the harbingers of enormous misfortunes, but I hold that those did not happen because the marvellous occurrences took place but that these took place because the misfortunes were going to occur, only the reason for their occurrence is concealed by their rarity, and consequently is not understood as are the risings and setting of the planets described above and many other phenomena.
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§ 2.98 [28] Stars are also seen throughout the daytime in company with the sun, usually actually surrounding the sun's orb like wreaths made of ears of corn and rings of changing colour — for instance, when
Augustus Caesar in early manhood entered the city after the death of his father to assume his mighty surname. Similar haloes occur round the moon and round the principal fixed stars. [29] A bow appeared round the sun in the consulship of
Lucius Opimius and
Quintus Fabius [121 BCE], a hoop in that of
Gaius Porcius and
Manius Acilius [114 BCE], and a red ring in that of
Lucius Julius and
Publius Rutilius [90 BCE]. [30] Portentous and protracted eclipses of the sun occur, such as the one after the murder of
Caesar the dictator and during the Antonine war which caused almost a whole year's continuous gloom.
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§ 2.99 [31] Again, several suns are seen at once, neither above nor below the real sun but at an angle with it, never alongside of nor opposite to the earth, and not at night but either at sunrise or at sunset. It is also reported that once several suns were seen at midday at the Bosphorus, and that these lasted from dawn till sunset. In former times three suns have often been seen at once, for example in the consulships of
Spurius Postumius and
Quintus Mucius [174 BCE], of
Quintus Marcius and
Marcus Porcius [118 BCE], of
Marcus Antonius and
Publius Dolabella [44 BCE], and of
Marcus Lepidus and
Lucius Plancus [42 BCE]; and our generation saw this during the principate of his late Majesty
Claudius, in his consulship, when
Cornelius Orfitus [51 CE] was his colleague. It is not stated that more than three suns at a time have ever been seen hitherto. [32] Also three moons have appeared at once, for instance in the consulship of
Gnaeus Domitius and
Gaius Fannius [122 BCE].
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§ 2.100 [33] A light from the sky by night, the phenomenon usually called 'night-suns,' was seen in the consulship of
Gaius Caecilius and
Gnaeus Papirius [113 BCE] and often on other occasions causing apparent daylight in the night. [34] In the consulship of
Lucius Valerius and
Gaius Marius [100 BCE] a burning shield scattering sparks ran across the sky at sunset from west to east. [35] In the consulship of
Gnaeus Octavius and
Gaius Scribonius [76 BCE] a spark was seen to fall from a star and increase in size as it approached the earth, and after becoming as large as the moon it diffused a sort of cloudy daylight, and then returning to the sky changed into a torch; this is the only record of this occurring. It was seen by the proconsul
Silanus and his suite. [36] Also stars appear to shoot to and fro; and this invariably portends the rise of a fierce hurricane from the same quarter.
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§ 2.101 [37] Stars also come into existence at sea and on land. I have seen a radiance of star-like appearance clinging to the javelins of soldiers on sentry duty at night in front of the rampart; and on a voyage stars alight on the yards and other parts of the ship, with a sound resembling a voice, hopping from perch to perch in the manner of birds. These when they come singly are disastrously heavy and wreck ships, and if they fall into the hold burn them up. If there are two of them, they denote safety and portend a successful voyage; and their approach is said to put to flight the terrible star called
Helena: for this reason they are called
Castor and
Pollux, and people pray to them as gods for aid at sea. They also shine round men's heads at evening time; this is a great portent. All these things admit of no certain explanation; they are hidden away in the grandeur of nature.
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