The Comet was first sighted by the German astronomer Bienewitz (“Apianus”) in midsummer of this year. Zwingli preached about it as an omen of disaster.
German astrologers regarded it as a herald of the wars between Spain and France, which broke out in that year, and of the bloody war carried into Hungary by the Turks under Soleyman, who ravaged the Danube country to the very walls of Vienna. These wars were followed by a visitation of the black plague.
In the Netherlands the breaking of the ocean dykes caused terrific floods, in which over 400,000 people were drowned.
Toward the close of the year the Comet passed over to the Southern Hemisphere.
To the aborigines of South America it proved a star of dreadful omen. During this year the most cruel of Spanish conquerors did their bloodiest work in the New World—Cortez in Mexico, Alvarado at the Equator, and Pizarro in Peru. Before the Comet disappeared from view, several hundred thousand wretched Incas and Aztecs had been slaughtered by the Spaniards, while many more hundred thousands were worked to death as slaves.
1456
The Comet this year was observed throughout Europe and also in China. It came into view over Europe on the 29th of May, and was seen gliding over the sky towards the moon.
Writers of that period say that it shone with exceeding brightness and spread out a fan-shaped train of fire. The Arab astronomers describe its shape as that of a Turkish scimitar, which, blazing against the dark sky, was regarded as a sign from heaven of the war then raging against the Christian infidels.
A clear story of the Comet’s appearance has been left by the Bavarian Jesuit, Brueckner (Pontanus). He based his story on the record of Georgos Phranza, Grandmaster of the Wardrobes to the Emperor of Constantinople. There the Comet is described as “rising in the West; moving towards the East, and approaching the Moon.”
By the Chinese this Comet was described as having a tail sixty degrees long, and a head “which at one time was round, and the size of a bull’s eye, the tail being like a peacock’s.”