x 
Star-Showers of Former Times. 359 
“A comet was visible in February, from 3 o’clock to 9 for 
twenty five days at the same hour. * * * In Judea this comet was 
seen fifty days decreasing. * * * Shortly after the Stars seemed 
to rain down from Heaven.” —Clark’s Mirrour:—[Short’s] Gen. 
Chron. Hist. of the Air, &c. Vol. 1, p.107,. > # 
The following passage (nearly identical with that above given,) 
is quoted from Schnurrer’s Die Krankheiten des Menschenge- 
schlechts, 1825, (Bd. 1, s. 230,) by M. A. Erman, in Poggendorff’’s 
Annalen der Physik, B. 48, s. 585, (1839. ) 
“Anno 1106, pridie Idus Februar. apud Baram Italiz stelle 
vise sunt in ceelo per diem, nunc quasi inter se concurrentes, 
nunc quasi in terram cadentes.” + 
The foregoing is cited by Erman in support of his hypothesis 
that the meteoric stream from which are derived the ‘shooting 
stars which at the present’ time are seen about the 10th of Au- 
gust, intervenes between the earth and sun about the 6th of Feb- 
ty. The account does indeed seem to assert that the meteors 
Were seen in the day time, but it is evident that unless they were 
at least as brilliant as the planet Venus, they would not be visible 
in sueh circumstances. There was no eclipse of the sun on this 
day. Perhaps. the story may be cleared up by reference to the 
Annales Boicorum of Aventinus, from which many fearful prod- 
igies are quoted in the Magdeburgh Ecclesiastical History, as hap- 
Petling at this time. Without the quotation from Clark's Mir- 
rour, it would be doubtful whether the number of meteors seen 
at this time was larger than usual. 
(27.) A.D. 1122. April 4. In the year of our Lord 1122, on 
the day before the nones of April, at the fourth watch of the 
hight, while the brethren were chanting the Synaxis nocturnalis, 
innumerable stars were seen falling, and as it were raining down, 
throughout the world.” 
“Hoe interea tempore, anno Dominic Incarnationis ejus mil- 
lesimo centesimo vicesimo secundo, pridie Nonas Aprilis, quarta 
Vigilia noctis, cum Fratres nocturnalem Synaxim decantarent, 
Stelle de Coelo innumerabiles cadere, et quasi pluere vise sunt, 
ubique per totum orbem terrarum.”—Chronica Sacri Monasterii 
ow, lib. 4, cap. Ixxix, in Muratori, Rer. Jt. Ser. t. iv, p. 
1122. Stelle innumere quasi pluere vise sunt pridie Non. 
Aprilis hora matutina.—Anonymi Monachi Cassinensis Breve 
Chronicon ; in Muratori, Rer. It. Scr. t. v, p. 61. 
