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Published on: S

November 11, 1680

Rome. A hen is famous for never having laid an egg. Then suddenly she lays one, but not just any egg: one with a comet on it. The comet does indeed arrive, and the story spreads throughout Europe via broadsheets (a type of large sheet of paper on a specific theme, printed in hundreds of copies), especially in Protestant German regions, where it is told in an anti-papal vein.