The name Easter derives from Eostre, the old Teutonic goddess of the dawn, and the association with sunrise is apparent in the old belief that the sun dances on an Easter Sunday morning.
The 17th-century poet John Suckling, for example, alludes to the phenomenon while contemplating the agility of a young lady who has caught his eye: But oh, she dances such a way;
No sun upon an Easter day
Is half so fine a sight.
Meteorologists are no experts on the terpsichorean skills of young ladies, but they have an answer ready when it comes to dancing suns. When the sun is very low in the sky, refraction or "bending" of the light beams sometimes results in strange optical effects. Under certain atmospheric conditions, the solar disc may take on strange shapes, or even appear to be divided into two or several parts.
These optical changes sometimes come in quick succession, and it was not difficult for our imaginative ancestors to believe that the Easter morning sun may have been dancing on the horizon.
Other Easter morning weather phenomena could provide the backdrop for more sinister events. In a melodramatic Easter epic, The Skerry of Shrieks, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow describes what happened when the 11th-century King Olaf of Norway had an Easter party; Now from all King Olaf's farms His men-at-arms Gathered on the eve of Easter; To his house at Angvaldness Fast they press, Drinking with the royal feaster.
In due course, the revellers repair to bed, and the onshore breeze, laden with moisture after its long passage over the sea, cools as it drifts in over the chilly foreshore. Predictably, its moisture condenses into sea fog: Pacing up and down the yard, King Olaf's guard Saw the sea-mist slowly creeping O'er the sands and up the hill, Gathering still Round the house where they were sleeping.
Soon there comes a rude awakening: Olaf's wily enemy, the druid Eyvind Kallda, uses this shroud of mist to launch a surprise attack upon the sleeping Norsemen. But Eyvind and his men are quickly overpowered, tied to a "skerry" on the beach - an old Norse name for a rock - and nature is allowed to do the rest. Olaf and his guests
Sat silent then, and heard once
more
The sullen roar
Of the ocean tides returning.
Finally Longfellow evocatively describes the gruesome end of the unfortunate Eyvind and his fellow villains:
Shrieks and cries of wild despair
Filled the air,
Growing fainter as they listened;
Then the bursting surge alone
Sounded on;
- Thus the sorcerers were christened!