188 C0SIM02. 



Hind near Capella, has very recently been visible at London, 

 near the Sun, on the day of its perihelion. 



taeus, and which was, on that account, erroneously considered by Pingr* 

 in his Cometographie, to signify one and the same person as Aristhcr.ea 

 or Alcisthenes. The brilhancy of this comet of Asteus diffused itself 

 over the third part of the sky ; the tail, which was called its way {odog), 

 was also 60° in length. It extended nearly as far as Orion, where it 

 gradually disappeared. In cap. vii., 9, the comet is mentioned which 

 appeared simultaneously with the famous fall of aerolites near Mso^ 

 Potamos (Cosmos, vol. i., p. 117), and which can scarcely be a confu- 

 sion with the aerolite-cloud described by Damachos, which shone for 

 70 days, and poured forth falling stars. Finally, Aristotle mentions 

 (cap. vii., IC) a comet which appeared at the time of the Archon Ni- 

 comachus, to which was ascribed a storm near Corinth. These four ap- 

 pearances of comets occurred during the long period of 32 Olympiads: 

 viz., the fall of aerolites, according to the Parian Chronicle, 01. 78, 1 

 (468 B.C.), under the Archon Theagenides ; the great comet of Asteus, 

 which appeared at the time of the earthquake at Achaia, and disap- 

 peared in the constellation of Orion, in Ol. 101, 4 (373 B.C.): Eucles, 

 the son of Molon, erroneously called Euclides Diodorus (xii., 53), in 

 Ol. 88, 2 (427 B.C.), as is also confirmed by the commentary of Jo- 

 hannes Philoponus: the comet of Nicomachus, in Ol. 109, 4 (341 B.C.) 

 The date assigned by Pliny for the jubce effigies rmitata in hastam, i^ 

 Ol. 108 (Plinius, ii., 25). Seneca also agrees in connecting the comet 

 of Asteus (Ol. 101, 4) immediately with the earthquake in Achaia, as 

 he mentions the downfall of Bura and Helice, which towns Aristotle 

 does not expressly mention, in the following manner: " Effigiem ignis 

 longi fuisse, Callisthenes tradit, antequam Burin et Helicon mare ab- 

 sconderet. Aristoteles ait, non trabera illam, sed cometam fuisse.' 

 " Callisthenes affirms that the fiery shape appeared long befoi'e the sea 

 overwhelmed Buris and Helice. Aristotle says that this was not a 

 meteor, but a comet." (Seneca, Nat. Qucest., vii., 5.) Strabo (viii., 

 p. 384, Cas.) places the downfall of these two frequently mentioned 

 towns two years before the battle of Leuctra, whence again results the 

 date, Ol. 101, 4. Finally, after Diodorus Siculus had more fully de- 

 scribed this event as having occurred under the Archon Asteus (xv., 

 48, 49), he places the brilliant comet which threw shadows (xv., 50) 

 under the Archon Alcisthenes, a year later, Ol. 102, 1 (372 A.C.), and 

 as a prediction of the decline of the Lacediemonian rule; but the later 

 Diodorus had the habit of transferring an event from one year to an- 

 other; and the oldest and most reliable witnesses, Aristotle and the 

 Parian Chronicle, speak in favor of the epoch of Asteus before that of 

 Alcisthenes. Now since the assumption of a period of revolution for 

 the beautiful Comet of 1843 of 147f years, leads Boguslawski to assign 

 to its appearances the dates 1695, 1548, 1401, and 1106, up to the year 

 371 before our era, the comet of the earthquake of Achaia corresponds 

 with it, according to Aristotle, within two — according to Diodorus, to 

 within one year; which, if we could know any thing of the similarity 

 of the orbit, is, when taking into consideration the probable disturban- 

 ces during a period of 1214 years, certainly a very small error. When 

 Pingr6, in the Comitographie (1783, torn, i., p. 259-262), relying upon 

 Diodorus and the Archon Alcisthenes instead of Asteus, places the 

 comet in question in Orion, in Ol. 102, and still in the commencement 

 of .July 371 before Christ, instead of 372, the reason perhaps lies in tha 



