Myths and Legends of Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights)

Now that I’ve told you all about the science behind the natural phenomenon called Aurora Borealis. It’s time to talk about how the ancient world and people of the past viewed these dancing lights. Would it come as a surprise if I tell you, people in the past weren’t exactly as thrilled to see these dancing lights as we are to see them today. You can’t blame them for being afraid of these lights. Back then all they had for company was the fear of unknown. I am talking about a time before Science revealed what these lights actually were. As H.P.Lovecraft said, “The oldest form of fear is the fear of the unknown”. Even today, humans have hardly found a way to deal with it.

Get your favourite drink and listen up, it’s Storytime!

Imagine walking through a lonely snowy forest terrain. With only thick spruce covered in snow and the long trail of your own footsteps for company. Moon and the million tiny stars spread across the night sky is the sole source of light here. You see a few reindeers accompanied by their herders at a distance, probably heading back home after a long taxing day.

You’ve never been to this part of the forest before. You need to cross the forest by foot before winter’s dreaded days of the dark arrives. That’s what the villager had said as a warning, before you started your journey. A time where one can hardly tell the difference between day and night. You try to call for help, to reach the herders perhaps, but they are all long gone. The temperatures keep dropping with time, the cold slowly creeps it’s way up your spine through your half frozen feet.

In this darkness, how would you feel if you saw strange lights in the night sky for the first time? No matter where you turn it somehow seems to be following you. You see strange shapes in it, a bull, dragon, serpent or was it a huge skull you can’t really tell.

As you keep staring at the illuminated dark sky, your eyes can’t quite capture the shapes you see in these lights. They seem to change their shape every now and then, pulsating and spreading throughout the dark sky like the lights were alive. Who knows what creatures hide deep within it? It sure looks dreamy yet all you remember is the warning the elders of the nearby village had mentioned in a passing, about the spirits of the dead visiting humans on nights like these.

I wouldn’t exactly say everyone feared the northern lights in the past but most did. Here are a few pictures from our second Northern Lights tour that we’d taken on 27-10-2022. [Read about our first experience in our previous blog] Mentioned below are a few amazing stories we heard about the northern lights, while everyone in our tour group had gathered around a campfire, with our cup of hot chocolate and chocolate cookies. This was the “Chasing Lights” bus tour. They’d taken us all the way to Kilpisjärvi, Lapland, Finland. That’s where the campfire was set up.

1.Tale of the Finnish Fire Fox: The Finnish name for Northern Lights is “Revontulet”. The word literally means “Firefox”. There are different versions of the folklore, but what’s common in them all are the furry fire foxes. It is said that Northern lights are caused by the arctic firefoxes racing across the sky. Their tails let out sparks of different coloured lights when they race from one snow mountain to the next. According to another version,a large amount of snow is swept off the mountains as the fire foxes run. The snow is what reflects the moonlight in different colours.

2. Vikings believed the Northern Lights was the glowing Bifrost Bridge that led their fallen brave warriors into their final resting place in Valhalla. Some believed they were reflections of Valkyries armour who led the warriors to Odin. While yet others saw the northern lights as the last breath of their warriors.

Not all believed northern lights to be a good omen, some saw the appearance of Northern lights as a bad omen.

1. Inuit people who lived in the Arctic believed Northern lights were the souls of the dead.

2. The Indigenous Sami People too believed Northern Lights were the souls of the dead. They considered it a bad omen. People feared and yet in ways respected Northern Lights. They discouraged even talking about Northern Lights out of fear. They considered it dangerous to tease, wave, point fingers at the lights or even sing while standing under the Northern lights. People believed if the lights saw you, they could reach down and pull you up into the sky with no one ever knowing how you went missing. This was why staying quiet and avoiding the attention of the lights was so important to them. Many Sami stay indoors even to date when the Northern lights show up, just to be safe.

Honestly I must say this last story freaked me out the most, especially as I was listening to this story from our guide while waiting for the lights to appear. Yeah right! with nothing but pitch darkness around me. Perhaps why it took me so long to sleep in the cabin that night.

Check out this blog for more such amazing stories on Northern Lights.

Until next time,
Aswathi & Unni
(Couple Travel Tales)