Seeing Is Believing - Visual Resources
"[...] all officers going on any service to the shore, or ice, or having communication with the natives, are to use their utmost endeavours to collect and procure every thing which may contribute to the advancement of natural knowledge; and of the larger animals, and other objects which cannot be removed, sketches and descriptions are to be taken"
John Ross, Captain, Given on board His Majesty's Ship Isabella, at Sea, this 17th day of August, 1818. "
Lantern Slides were a popular resource at this time: positive transparent photographs and drawings used to present media in a larger format. In the context of Arctic exploration, these slides were used to spark public interest in the Arctic and prompt funding from institutions and donors. These slides have anthropological and scientific significance and depict everything from the Aurora Borealis to rock and ice formations to Indigenous men playing skip-rope.
"But, in the absence of the great luminary, the vivid coruscations of the aurora borealis illuminate the wintry landscape, streaming across the skies in broad sheets of light, flashing in multi-colored rays, or quivering in faint and feathery scintillations—a light that takes away the irksomeness of gloom, and makes the long night wondrous."
Epes Sargent, The Wonders of the Arctic World, 1873
Polaris Expedition lantern slides, 1871-1873.
The same meteorological process causes sun and moon halos.
Parhelia
A parhelion (plural parhelia) is a meteorological phenomena caused as a result of light refracting off of hexagonal ice crystals in Cirrus clouds. These are also called 'mock-suns' or 'sundogs'.
Along with sailing uncharted waters and finding land that was known only by its Indigenous inhabitants, Arctic explorers in the 19th century documented unusual visual phenomena.
"[...] we reached the latitude of the sunken land of Buss, as it is laid down in some charts, namely, 57° 28'N.; and being desirous of determining whether such a bank really existed in long. 29° 45', we altered our course, being then in 28° 20', to N.W., for the purpose of ascertaining the fact. We made all sail ahead [..] being near the spot, shortened sail, and hove to, in order to sound; but no bottom was found in one hundred and eighty fathoms. Our sounding was repeated every four miles, with no better success."
Capt. John Ross's Diary, Voyage of Discovery (1818)
Buss Island was a phantom island claimed to be spotted, or even visited, by explorers as far back as the 1600s. Buss Island was said to be situated somewhere between southern Greenland and Ireland, and was said to be full of gold and rare jewels. However, the existence of this island was disproven as being a visual phenomena that lasted for hundreds of years, over hundreds of explorers.