The Mowing-Devil: or, Strange News out of Hartford-shire is the title of an English pamphlet published in 1678. The pamphlet describes a night following a dispute with a neighbour, a farmers field appeared to be in flame. The next morning, the field was found to be perfectly mowed, “that no mortal man was able to do the like”.
This pamphlet, and the accompanying illustration, are often cited by crop circle researchers as among the first recorded cases of crop circles.
The crop circle phenomena is also commonly associated with glowing light “orbs”, which in 1678 would have been described as “flame” as this was the primary source of light at the time and lends further credence to the crop circle association.
