A special blog seeing
as we have a wonderful Blood Moon tonight.
What makes it so special? This time Mars will be the closest it has been since 2003.
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| Blood Moon - Here's one I prepared earlier. Photo by me as noted by poor quality. |
The last time these two
events, a total lunar eclipse and the opposition of Mars, lined up was in the
year A.D. 792. And apparently it won't
occur again for hundreds of years. How lucky are we?
.Mars has been growing
brighter the past few weeks as it slowly approaches a state that astronomers
call opposition, tonight, when it and the sun are on opposite sides of Earth. Earth
and Mars align with the sun in opposition about once every two years.
But let us go back to
the year A.D.792 - What was happening then and why is this relevant to my blog?
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
tells us - 'A.D. 792. This year Offa, King of Mercia, commanded that
King Ethelbert should be beheaded; and Osred, who had been king of the
Northumbrians, returning home after his exile, was apprehended and slain, on
the eighteenth day before the calends of October. His body is deposited at
Tinemouth. Ethelred this year, on the third day before the calends of October,
took unto himself a new wife, whose name was Elfleda.'
My main character, a Noble Warrior to King Ó”thelred, was right smack
bang in the middle of all that drama, especially in Northumbria. Perhaps he was looking up at the night sky
during the lunar eclipse, and perhaps he noticed one star brighter than usual,
or then again, perhaps he did not.
But for me, tonight, I will believe that I am witnessing, or
living through, the same phenomenon in which my main character also experienced, or at least lived through
1,226 years ago.
Wow! Ok, so maybe the wow
is more exciting for me, but I love that I have this wonderful link with my
main man. This wonderful connection between a man who lived so many years ago
and me, the person writing about him.
Who was this Noble Warrior you ask? He is none of those listed above in the Chronicle,
but you will learn more as my story becomes a reality.
