Wonders in the Sky (61 page)

“Jacob made this statement to me in the presence of his parents on St. Michael's Day 1759. This boy has quite a simple, pious, meek and gentle character. He is praised by everyone; all his life he has been known to take pleasure in reading and contemplating God's words whenever he has some spare time.”

 

Source:
Ramsberg sockens kyrkobok
, E1:1, 1786-1774, handwritten entry by Reverend Vigelius. The book is kept at Landsarkivet, Uppsala, Sweden. Translation by Clas Svahn.

344.

7 May 1761, France: Planetoid orbiting Venus

Prominent French astronomer J. L. Lagrange observed an object that seemed to be in orbit around Venus. He announced that its orbital plane was perpendicular to the ecliptic. Venus was then an evening “star” at 207° heliocentric longitude and 34° elongation.

 

Source: “The Problematical Satellite of Venus,”
The Observatory
7 (1884): 222-226.

345.

6 June 1761, unknown location
Planetoid orbiting Venus

Astronomer Scheuten reported an object that he observed while tracking Venus in transit across the disk of the Sun. The planet was accompanied by a smaller dark spot on one side, which followed Venus in its transit.

 

Source: “The Problematical Satellite of Venus,”
The Observatory
7 (1884): 222-226.

346.

26 December 1761, Weyloe, Denmark
A pale object emits a beam

“The following letter was received from Weyloe, in the diocese of Copenhagen:

“On the 26th of December last, about ten at night, there arose a great storm. I did not go to bed, and about four minutes past two in the morning, I observed a sudden light across my windows, which I took for lightning: the storm at this time increased not a little. I kept my eye fixed at my window; and at four o'clock I perceived a ray of light which seemed to come in a horizontal direction from the moon, to appearance about a toise and half (nine feet) in length, and about the thickness of a man's arm. Rays darted from it on each side.

“Running into my garden, I saw a ball of fire, about the size of a common ball, running gently from south to north. At first the ball was of a pale colour, like the sun covered with clouds, and threw out many rays. It grew more and more red, and smaller, and in two minutes disappeared without noise or smoke. My astonishment was the greater, as the tempest ceased soon after, though it had been accompanied with such violent blasts of wind, that many imagined they felt the shock of an earthquake. I have spoken to a dozen of people, who also saw it. Of all the phaenomena I have seen in Norway, I remember none equal to this, nor attended with like circumstances.”

Given the weather environment, one could hypothesize globular lightning, but the description of multiple beams is highly unusual.

 

Source:
The annual register, or a view of the history, politics, and literature, for the year 1761,
5th Ed (London: J. Dodsley, 1786), 67.

347.

February 1762, Nuremberg, Germany
Unknown astronomical object

Single object, “a black round spot” passing in front of the Sun, as observed by Mr. Staudacher. He missed it the next day, and commented, “Perhaps this is a new planet.”

 

Source: “Observations of the transits of intra-mercurial planets or other bodies across the Sun's disk.”
The Observatory
(1879): 135.

348.

9 August 1762, Basel and Solothurn, Switzerland
Slow-flying spindle in the Sky

Two witnesses at separate observatories (Rostan in Basel and Croste in Solothurn) reported a vast spindle-shaped cigar in slow flight in front of the Sun.

Monsieur de Rostan, an astronomer and member of the Medicophysical Society of Basel, Switzerland, observed the object with the aid of a telescope as it eclipsed the sun. This object could be observed daily for almost a month from Lausanne and also by a second astronomer in Sole, near Basel. Monsieur de Rostan traced its outline with a
camera obscura
and sent the image to the Royal Academy of Sciences in Paris. The drawing has not been preserved, unfortunately, but there is no doubt that it once existed and was regarded with some amazement. As this is historically an important incident the original report is produced in full below:

 

An account of a very singular phenomenon seen in the disk of the sun, in different parts of Europe, and not in others.

 

“The 9th of August, 1762, M. de Rostan, of the economic society at Berne, of the medico-physical society at Basle, while he was taking the sun's altitudes with a quadrant, at Lausanne, to verify a meridian, observed that the sun gave but a faint pale light, which he attributed to the vapours of the Leman lake; however, happening to direct a fourteen foot telescope, armed with a micrometer, to the sun, he was surprised to see the eastern side of the sun, as it were, eclipsed about three digits, taking in a kind of nebulosity, which environed the opaque body, by which the sun was eclipsed.

“In the space of about two hours and a half, the fourth side of the said body, whatever it was, appeared detached from the limb of the sun; but the limb, or, more properly, the northern extremity of this body, which had the shape of a spindle, in breadth about three of the sun's digits, and nine in length, did not quit the sun's northern limb. This spindle kept continually advancing on the sun's body, from east towards west, with no more than about half the velocity with which the ordinary solar spots move; for it did not disappear till the 7th of September, after having reached the sun's western limb.

“M. Rostan, during that time, observed it almost every day; that is to say, for near a month; and, by means of a camera obscura, he delineated the figure of it, which he sent to the royal academy of sciences at Paris.

“The same phenomenon was observed at Sole, in the bishopric of Basle, situated about five and forty German leagues northward of Lausanne. M. Coste, a friend of M. de Rostan, observed it there, with a telescope of eleven feet, and found it of the same spindle-like form, as M. de Rostan, only it was not quite so broad; which, probably, might be owing to this, that growing near the end of its apparition, the body began to turn about, and present its edge.

“A more remarkable circumstance is, that at Sole it did not answer to the same point of the sun as it did at Lausanne: it therefore had a considerable parallax: but what so very extraordinary a body, placed between the sun and us, should be, is not easy to divine. It was no spot, since its motion was greatly too slow; nor was it a planet or comet, its figure seemingly proving the contrary. In a word, we know of nothing to have recourse to in the heavens, whereby to explain this phenomenon; and, what adds to the oddness of it, M. Messier, who, constantly observed the sun at Paris during the same time, saw nothing of such an appearance.”

 

Source: “Natural History: An Account of a Very Singular Phenomena Seen in the Disk of the Sun, in Different Parts of Europe, and Not in Others,”
Annual Register
9 (1766): 120-121.

349.

19 November 1762, Location unknown: Planetoid