52: GREAT BALLS OF FIRE | Santelmo - Part 1: Flaming Orbs of Death?

Goodness, gracious! This week, we fire it up with a deep dive into the legend and lore behind the Santelmo, or St. Elmo’s Fire. Were these mystical balls of fire omens of death and destruction… or a sign pointing to hidden treasure?

Buckle up as we go into tangents you never expected: from old sailors tales, to physics concepts about plasma and electricity they didn’t teach us in high school,  to the patron saint of abdominal pains. 

Learn about the various sightings of the Santelmo in ‘rural legends’ of old and recent memory, the historical origins of the story and where the name comes from, and how the legend continues to live in popular imagination.

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The Gods Must Be Crazy is a podcast on Philippine Mythology hosted by friends Anama Dimapilis and Ice Lacsamana, avid mythology nerds and semi-professional gossips. Follow us over at @godsmustbecrazy.pod on Instagram and Facebook for more good stuff. We welcome any suggestions on future topics or episodes.  You can also join us on Patreon at www.patreon.com/thegodsmustbecrazypodcast.

You can also find us on Youtube – Gods Must Be Crazy Podcast channel, where we post some of our episodes and interviews. For other inquiries, please email us at [email protected]

The intro and outro music is by Brian O’Reilly (@dendriform on Instagram).

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References/Further Reading:

https://www.esquiremag.ph/long-reads/features/santelmo-origin-trese-a00293-20210614-lfrm

https://www.aswangproject.com/santelmo/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Elmo%27s_fire

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erasmus_of_Formia

https://www.oca.org/saints/lives/2014/05/04/101292-holy-confessor-erasmus-bishop-of-formia-in-campania

https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=182

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ball_lightning

https://trese.fandom.com/wiki/Santelmo