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(#9) The Creation Of Halley's Comet Is Shrouded In Mystery
According to Susan Wyckoff, a physicist who took part in research of the comet at Arizona State University in Tempe, Halley's Comet is completely unlike anything else in the solar system. It's not just that the comet has an unusual route, but it also has an odd ratio of carbon-12 and carbon-13 isotopes.
No one knows exactly why the comet has such a strange makeup, but one theory is that before the comet broke off from its original body (a nebular disc that surrounded the Sun within 10 million years of the its creation), it was "splattered" by a supernova. After breaking away from the disc, Halley's Comet began its lengthy trip through the solar system.
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(#10) Ancient Civilizations Believed The Comet Predicted Calamities
Halley's Comet wasn't always a thing of wonder. Prior to humanity's scientific knowledge of celestial bodies, many people believed the comet was a sign of terrible things to come. People believed it predicted everything from war, famines, and even the end of days.
In 66 CE, first-century Romano-Jewish scholar Flavius Josephus believed the "star resembling a sword” meant the coming destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. Hundreds of years later, Holy Roman Emperor Louis the Pious thought the comet was an omen signaling his eventual demise. Even though we now know Halley's has no affect on our day to day lives, there are still people who still believe the comet is a sign of the end times.
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(#3) Some People Believe Halley's Comet Was The Star Of Bethlehem
The problem with being the most famous comet in the solar system is that everyone projects their personal beliefs onto you. It's been speculated that Halley's Comet was the "star" the three wise men followed in order to find Jesus, but it doesn't really fit the timeline.
It's likely Jesus was born during sometime between 6 and 4 BCE, which doesn't work with the comet's timeline, as it appeared in both 164 BCE and 87 BCE. This doesn't mean the wise men didn't see a comet - it just wasn't Halley's Comet.
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(#6) Mark Twain's Life Eerily Mirrored The Comet's Orbit
Mark Twain was an anomaly. Not just because his writing was able to beautifully encapsulate every day life, or because he somehow always had a perfectly tailored white linen suit. He was also one of the few people whose life lined up nearly exactly with Halley's Comet.
He was born two weeks after the comet appeared in 1835, and he passed when it returned in 1910. Of his relation to the comet, he said:
"I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don’t go out with Halley’s Comet. The Almighty has said, no doubt: ‘Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together."
He died one day after the comet soared through the sky.
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(#5) Genghis Khan Believed It Was His "Personal Star"
Genghis Khan was the founder of the Mongol Empire, a vast army of disparate nomadic tribes, whose rule extended across modern-day China, Korea, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and substantial portions of Eastern Europe and Southwest Asia. When Halley's orbited in 1222 CE, Khan supposedly took inspiration from the comet and believed it was his "personal star." He decided to follow the comet west into southeastern Europe and continue the growth of his empire.
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(#4) The Comet May Have Caused A Decade-Long Winter Starting In 536 CE
According to some researchers, around the year 536 CE a decade-long winter began, and it had something to do with Halley's Comet. Scholars in Europe and Asia at the time reported 536 CE and the following years were absolutely freezing. Their writings describe what sounds like a large celestial body passing across the Sun. This caused a deep freeze, which completely destroyed crops and lead to years of famine.
Geologist Dallas Abbott believes that on its trip past the Sun, Halley's Comet broke up; the resulting pieces of debris that fell to Earth created a large dust cloud, effectively blocking out the sun. An analysis of Greenland ice in 2013 from 533 - 540 CE shows "large amounts of atmospheric dust during this seven-year period, not all of it originating from Earth," according to Abbott.
Researchers also believe it could have been the reason humanity was more vulnerable to "Justinian's plague" from 541-542 CE. That being said, there's still quite a lot of research to do before we can place blame for this theoretical freeze on the comet.
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The Halley’s Comet has an orbital period of 76 to 79 years, and the next time it crosses perihelion is July 28, 2061. The Halley’s Comet is The Halley’s Comet has an orbital period of 76 to 79 years, and its next pass through perihelion will be on July 28, 2061. The Halley’s Comet was the first periodic comet to be recorded, and its appearance was well documented in China, ancient Babylon, and medieval Europe until 240 BC or 466 BC, but they didn’t know it was the same comet.
This randomly generated tool catalogs 14 items that you don’t know about the history of the supernatural, including the fact that it once filled our atmosphere with deadly cyanide in 1910, some people believe that Halley’s Comet is Star of Bethlehem and so on, many of which we’ve never heard before.
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