The aurora borealis is one of the most compelling heavenly phenomena because of its stunning aesthetic display and because of its relatively unpredictable appearance in the northern hemispheric skies. Also known as the Northern Lights, the aurora borealis also has a lesser-known southern hemispheric counterpart known as the aurora australis. The Northern Lights has garnered far more attention, possibly because of the greater concentration of human population in the northern polar circle and the lack of human inhabitants on Antarctica. The indigenous peoples of Northern Eurasia and Northern North America offered a litany of folkloric legends about the origin and phenomena of the Northern Lights. The aurora borealis has been largely divested of its mythical significance now that the phenomenon is well-understood by astronomers, geologists, and meteorologists. Nevertheless, the Northern Lights are stunning enough to evoke wonder at even the most jaded scientist. Pettersen (1994) waxes poetic about the Northern Lights: "The Northern lights are poetry, they are nature's light show, and they are quantum leaps in the oxygen atom."
             Mythology and science seem to commingle in the presence of the aurora borealis. As Brady (1999) notes, "The true story is that the sun is the father of the auroras." In more bellicose terminology, the aurora borealis results from solar wind crashing into the earth's atmosphere. Whether described in scientific or mythic-poetic terminology, the aurora continues to captivate and mystify its viewers.
             Some folklorists suggest that the term Northern Lights stems from Old Norse texts (Ward). According to one Finnish legend, the aurora borealis is caused by an arctic fox spraying snow with its tale and thus the aurora borealis is called "foxfire," or revontulet, in Finnish. The name aurora borealis is compiled of Roman and Greek mythological terms: Aurora was the Roman goddess of the d...