While the term "Night of the Long Knives" is now usually used to refer to a few days in 1934 Nazi Germany it can also be used to describe an event in Australia in 2010 and was used to describe the "meeting" Hengest and Horsa had with British natives during the Germanic invasion(s) of England. This got me to wondering, how many other "Nights of the Long Knives" are there and which was the first? Is the story of Hengest and Horsa the first reference we have or are there other, earlier references - from Ancient Greece or Rome perhaps?
It has several connotations, but the true 'Night of the Long Knives' was Hitler's purge of the SA and merger into the SS. This was also known as the Röhm-putsch (Hitler had made Röhm vilified as a coup waiting to happen as an excuse to murder him).
Another usage of the term 'Night of the Long Knives' is Harold Macmillan's cabinet reshuffle in 1962, in Britain. There's several, several events that have this moniker attached to it, but all done after 1934