"Unusual Rainbow and White Rainbow" A new auroral candidate in oriental historical sources

Abstract

Solar activity has been recorded as auroras or sunspots in various historical sources. These records are of much importance for investigating both long-term solar activities and extremely intense solar flares. In previous studies, they were recorded as "vapor," "cloud," or "light," especially in oriental historical sources; however, the terminology was not discussed adequately and is still quite vague. In this paper, we suggest the possibility of "unusual rainbow" and "white rainbow" as candidates of historical auroras in oriental historical sources and examine if it is probable. This discovery will help us to make more comprehensive historical auroral catalogues and require us to add these terms to auroral candidates in oriental historical sources.

arXiv commentAccepted by Publ. Astron. Soc. Japan

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Cited by in corpus (10)

• Records of Sunspots and Aurora Candidates in the Chinese Official Histories of the Yuán and Míng Dynasties during 1261-1644
• The earliest drawings of datable auroras and a two-tail comet from the Syriac Chronicle of Zūqnīn
• Historical Auroras in the 990s: Evidence for Great Magnetic Storms
• A Great Space Weather Event in February 1730
• Do the Chinese Astronomical Records Dated AD 776 January 12/13 Describe an Auroral Display or a Lunar Halo? A Critical Re-examination
• Earliest Datable Records of Aurora-like Phenomena in the Astronomical Diaries from Babylonia
• Records of sunspot and aurora activity during 581-959 CE in Chinese official histories in the periods of Suí, Táng, and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms
• Unusual rainbows as auroral candidates: another point of view
• Records of Auroral Candidates and Sunspots in Rikkokushi, Chronicles of Ancient Japan from Early 7th Century to 887
• Sporadic Aurora near Geomagnetic Equator: In the Philippines, on 27 October 1856