Abstract
THE explanation given by Mr. G. Henry Kinahan* of the superstition prevalent in Ireland regarding “showers of blood”is extremely interesting, and to a great extent the true one; but any student of Irish history must feel how difficult it is to apply it to the interpretation of not a few prodigies recorded in the earliest chronicles. The word “blood”is frequently met with in accounts of wars, in such a manner as to make it quite impossible to construe it into an allusion to the Aurora; nor is it in many places capable of a dual meaning, for instance, the “Chionicum Scotorum”† under A.D. 531, says, in relating the drowning and burning of Mu'rcsrtach Mac Erca,—
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JEREMIAH, J. Early Mention of the Aurora Borealis . Nature 3, 174–175 (1870). https://doi.org/10.1038/003174a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/003174a0
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