Wednesday's total eclipse of the sun will see a surge in pre-millennial tension as the weeks count down to the end of the century amid predictions of a worldwide computer crash and visions of a second coming of Christ.
End of time predictions have occurred regularly throughout history, but the doom-mongers - predominantly Christian - argue that the conjunction of the calendar change, the programming glitch known as the "millennium bug" in which computers will misread time, and sundry other biblical and astronomical indications mean that this time, the end of the world really is nigh.
The dimming of the sun's light over Europe and parts of Asia on Wednesday comes barely a month after an end-of-the-world prediction by the famed 16th-century French surgeon Nostradamus had millions of Japanese quaking in apprehension.
Between 20 and 40% of Japanese reportedly believe there is some truth in the sayings of Nostradamus, which include the following: "In the year 1999, seven months. From the sky will come the King of Terror. He will resurrect the great King of the Moguls, before and after Mars reigns."
Britain's Channel Four television ran a seven-hour Nostradamus extravaganza last month based on the premise that the seer had foretold the end of the world for the next day, promising minute-by-minute coverage.
The failure of the apocalypse to materialise at the appointed moment has done little to affect the sales of books about the French sage, whose notoriously vague phrasings are credited with predicting such events as the French Revolution, the rise of Hitler, the assassination of President John F Kennedy and the Kosovo conflict.
According to Stefan Paulus, author of Nostradamus 1999, Nostradamus also predicted that a meteor would hit the earth in September 1999, causing huge tidal waves, earthquakes, hurricanes, clouds of dust, political upheaval and famine across the globe.
Others have picked on September 9, or 9/9/99, as the moment of doom, since "9999" is used as a termination signal in some computer programmes.
They claim that this will cause a worldwide electrical failure, bringing disaster and chaos which, with the onset of the year-end "millennium bug", will finally trigger the arrival of the Antichrist.
Rabbi Philip Berg of the Los Angeles Kabbalah Learning Centre, which has attracted the interest of Hollywood stars ranging from Madonna to Elizabeth Taylor, has opted for September 11 as the day when a great ball of fire will hit the earth.
Inclinations to pessimism can be countered, however, by considering the long list of previous end of time predictions which have not panned out, including the following:
- January 1 1000: Some Christians gave their possessions to the Church following predictions that the world would end on this date. But most citizens were unaware of what year it was. The Church did not return the gifts.
- 1534, Muenster, Germany: Anabaptists barricaded themselves in the city in the firm belief that the Second Coming was nigh. They shifted from puritanism to sexual licence, then were starved into submission and their leaders killed.
- 1736, London: Incited by a prophet known as Whiston, Londoners fled to the high ground of Hampstead as a prelude to the end of the world.
- 1919: US meteorologist Albert Porta predicted that the conjunction of six planets would generate a magnetic current that would cause the sun to explode and engulf the earth on December 17.
- 1967: Conservative Christians believed that the capture of the whole of Jerusalem by the Israeli army during the Six Day War would trigger the Rapture - the raising of the just to heaven while the world perished in flames.
- 1988: Nasa scientist Edgar Whisenaut published 88 Reasons why the Rapture will Occur in 1988 and sold an astounding four million copies. The October 11 date he set for the Rapture came and went.
- 1992: David Koresh's Branch Dravidian group in Waco, Texas, believed the world would end in 1995. He and 75 other devotees died in a fire on April 10 1993 following a 51-day siege that had strong echoes of the Muenster drama.
- 1992: Korean Christian pastor Lee Jang Rim predicted the Rapture for October 28. Some of his followers committed suicide when it failed to happen.
- 1993, Ukraine: The White Brotherhood cult in Kiev proclaimed the end of the world. A small crowd turned out to watch. Nothing happened. They tried again, announcing the end for nine days later. Even fewer people turned out.
- 1997: The arrival of the Hale-Bopp comet in March was seen by the Heaven's Gate cult, based in San Diego, California, as the signal that the world was about to end. They committed mass suicide in the hope of escaping to another galaxy. - Sapa-AFP