The Perseid meteor shower was first recorded in AD 36, according to historical accounts.
That date places written evidence for the shower in the early Roman era, long before the modern scientific naming and measurement of meteor streams. Historical records are valuable because they show that recurring celestial displays were noticed centuries before astronomers understood them as debris streams associated with comets.
The Perseids are now linked to Comet Swift–Tuttle. Their name comes from Perseus, the constellation area from which the meteors appear to radiate. The radiant is a perspective effect: the meteors travel along nearly parallel paths, making their tracks seem to diverge from one region of the sky.
The AD 36 record should not be confused with the comet’s modern discovery in 1862 or its rediscovery in 1992. Those dates concern the parent comet, while AD 36 refers to an early historical record of the meteor shower’s activity.