Case file · Sighting
First omen: the fiery column in the east
The first omen in the Florentine Codex is a great 'ear of fire', like a wound in the sky, that rose in the east each night about ten years before the Spaniards arrived and faded at dawn.
1509 CE · 19.44, -99.13 · status: legend
The account
Later accounts add a comet seen by day and say Moctezuma consulted the ruler of Texcoco, Nezahualpilli, who read it as a sign of coming ruin. The approximate date follows the chroniclers' 'ten years before'.
The sceptical view
Astronomers have proposed bright comets or the zodiacal light as candidates, but the source gives no date precise enough to match an event.