1561 Celestial Phenomenon over Nuremberg

In April 1561, residents of Nuremberg, then a free imperial city of the Holy Roman Empire, reported an unusual aerial display at dawn. A broadsheet printed that same month by Hans Glaser recorded that many men and women had witnessed what it described as an aerial battle out of the sun on the morning of April 14, with numerous shapes, including spheres, cylinders, crosses and crescents, appearing to move erratically overhead before seeming to fall to earth amid smoke. The broadsheet is one of the best known woodcut depictions of an unexplained celestial sighting from the period, and its cause has never been established with certainty. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/