Wonders in the Sky (96 page)

Fig. 53: French
jeton

It is said that on March 1st, 707 BC, during the outbreak of a plague, the second king of Rome, Numa Pompilius, witnessed the fall of an oval shield from the sky during a ceremony.

Somewhat astonished, he sought advice from the nymph Egeria and the nine Muses, who assured him that Jupiter had dropped it as a sign of his benevolence. The pestilence soon came to an end, so the grateful king had eleven identical copies made by an armourer, and those were used in dances and celebrations every year.

Around 60 AD the Roman poet Lucanus composed a long work in which he proposed an explanation for the event, suggesting that a stormy wind had whisked the shield out of a soldier's hand and sent it spinning across the sky. The story was long remembered in the literature and is likely depicted on this token, where the inscription reads:
Oportunus Adest
, “it arrives in time.” The same “flying disk” design appears on many jetons from different periods.

November 1661, Chaldan Monastery, Tibet Flying double hat

This case was mentioned by researcher W. Raymond Drake in 1975, based on the diary of a Jesuit father, Albert d'Orville:

D'Orville, a Belgian, wrote about a fascinating sighting at Lhasa, Tibet: “1661 November. My attention was attracted by something moving about in the heavens. I thought it was some unknown species of bird which lived in that country, when the thing on approaching took an aspect of a double Chinese-hat (the classical conical straw-hats) and flew rotating silently as if borne on invisible wings of the wind. It was surely a prodigy, an enchantment. That thing passed above the city, and as if it wished to be admired, it completed two circles, then surrounded by mist it vanished, and no matter how one strained its eyes it could no longer be seen.

“I asked myself whether the altitude where I was had not played some trick, however perceiving a lama not far away I asked whether he had seen it. After assenting by nodding his head, he said to me, ‘My Son, what you have seen is not magic. Beings from other worlds have for centuries sailed the seas of space, they brought intellectual illumination to the first people populating Earth, they banished all violence and taught men to love one another, but these teachings are like seed scattered on stone, which does not germinate. These Beings, all light, are well received by us and often descend near our monasteries teaching us and revealing things lost for centuries during the cataclysms which have changed the aspect of the world.'”

This would be a most interesting event if it had happened. Unfortunately the diary of Albert d'Orville does not seem to exist. We have come to the conclusion that the case is likely to be a hoax, first mentioned by a man named Alberto Fenoglio in a 1966 magazine entitled
Non è Magia
. It is quoted as authentic by several contemporary ufological writers and is widely reproduced all over Internet sites.

1663, Montréal, Québec, Canada
The language of Heaven

This case is based on a relation of what occurred in the Mission of the Fathers of the Society of Jesus in the country of New France, from the summer of 1662 to the summer of 1663:

Heaven and Earth have spoken to us many times during the past year, and that in a language both kind and mysterious, which threw us at the same time into fear and admiration. The Heavens began with Phenomena of great beauty, and the Earth followed with violent upheavals, which made it very evident to us that these mute and brilliant aërial voices were not, after all, mere empty words, since they presaged convulsions that were to make us shudder while making the Earth tremble.

As early as last autumn we saw fiery Serpents, intertwined in the form of the Caduceus, flying through mid-air, borne on wings of flame. Over Québec we beheld a great Ball of fire, which illumined the night almost with the splendor of day—had not our pleasure in beholding it been mingled with fear, caused by its emission of sparks in all directions. This same Meteor appeared over Montréal, but seemed to issue from the Moon's bosom, with a noise like that of Cannon or Thunder; and, after traveling three leagues in the air, it finally vanished behind the great mountain whose name that Island bears.

But what seemed to us most extraordinary was the appearance of three Suns. Toward eight o'clock in the morning, on a beautiful day last Winter, a light and almost imperceptible mist arose from our great river, and, when struck by the Sun's first rays, became transparent,—retaining, however, sufficient substance to bear the two Images cast upon it by that Luminary. These three Suns were almost in a straight line, apparently several ‘toises' distant from one another, the real one in the middle, and the others, one on each side. All three were crowned by a Rainbow, the colors of which were not definitely fixed; it now appeared iris-hued, and now of a luminous white, as if an exceedingly strong light had been at a short distance underneath.

This spectacle was of almost two hours' duration upon its first appearance, on the seventh of January, 1663; while upon its second, on the 14th of the same month, it did not last so long, but only until, the Rainbow hues gradually fading away, the two Suns at the sides also vanished, leaving the central one, as it were, victorious.

These are classic descriptions of what we recognize today as natural atmospheric phenomena.

 

Source:
The Jesuit relations and allied documents: travels and explorations of the Jesuit missionaries in New France
, 1610-1791: the original French, Latin, and Italian texts, with English translations and notes. Reuben Gold Thwaites, 1853-1913. (Cleveland: Burrows, 1899.)

19 January 1665, Québec, Canada
Fireballs, preceded by explosions

“About a quarter to six in the evening, there was heard to come from beneath the ground a report so loud as to be taken for a cannon-shot. This sound was heard by persons distant three and four leagues from one another; while our Savages, knowing that the cannon is not fired toward evening, except to give warning of the appearance of the Iroquois, left the woods where they were, and came all through the night to ask us why we had fired such a terrible cannon shot.

“About seven minutes after this report, there appeared over Québec a ball of fire which merely passed by, coming from the mountains toward the North and emitting so bright a light that houses two leagues from Québec was seen in broad day. In the course of the year there were seen several other similar fireballs, not only at Québec, but below Tadoussac, and on the way to Three Rivers.”

 

Source:
The Jesuit relations and allied documents: travels and explorations of the Jesuit missionaries in New France
, 1610-1791: the original French, Latin, and Italian texts, with English translations and notes. Reuben Gold Thwaites, 1853-1913. (Cleveland: Burrows, 1899.)

31 March 1676, Florence, Tuscany, Italy: Fiery globe

An Italian magazine called
Alata Quaderni
(No. 1, Feb 1979), mentions an ancient source which says “there appeared in the Tuscan sky a luminous thing in the shape of a disc or bag of grain or sheaf.” However, an authentic document describes it as a globe.

Fig. 54: Phenomenon in Tuscany

The object was undoubtedly a meteor, seen over much of Italy. It is mentioned by Father Louis Cotte in his
Traité de Météorologie
(Paris, 1784, p. 83) as “a luminous globe that crossed the Adriatic Sea,” and was seen all the way from Livorno to Corsica.

 

Source of the illustration:
Notizie Diverse di Firenze
—anno 1676, 406-407, found by a researcher in the Magonia Internet group. The original belongs to the Marquis Alessandro Loteringhi della Stufa, Calcione castle in Arezzo (Italy).

1685, Hatfield, Yorkshire, England: Fearful unknowns

Objects turning in the sky, frightening men and cattle. One destroyed some trees, fell into a river.

This phenomenon, like the following in Rutland, may relate to a weather anomaly, such as a mini-tornado, but its duration and behavior do place it within the literature of unusual aerial phenomena.