Raining Cats And Dogs

I was wondering about this idiom.. particularly about its ORIGIN..

Was it that it actually rained cats and dogs... or it was just another one from epics...????

And.. what I got was.. There's no specific origin of this idiom...

Some would say that in old England, they had hay roofs on their houses and the cats and dogs would sleep on the roof. When it rained, the roofs got slippery and the cats and dogs would slide off of the roofs. There for it was "Raining Cats and Dogs".

Another theory, "Rain Cats and Dogs" stems from the Norse Mythology. Cats were believed to represent the wind and dogs represented rain. Different animals represented different weather and natural phenomenon.

One supposed origin is that the phrase derives from mythology. Dogs and wolves were attendants to Odin, the god of storms, and sailors associated them with rain. Witches, who often took the form of their familiars - cats, are supposed to have ridden the wind. Well, some evidence would be nice. There doesn't appear to be any to support this notion.

One theory is that witches are associated with cats and storms, so perhaps when there was a really bad storm it was blamed on a witch for instance and therefore there would be cats nearby - this doesn't really explain the dogs bit though. Another theory is to do with the noise that dogs and cats make when fighting and the link between this and a storm, but no-one knows for sure!

At the end I am just sure that it definitely means "to rain heavily"..

Whatever its origin is...!!!! :P