Need help- will a 12 volt battery power a florescent light?

I have a couple 12 volt batteries from portable jumper cable / air compressor's I broke down. The batteries are still good the other parts just didn't work any more. I have about a 2 ft. florescent light I could put up at my dads - would these batteries power the light if I attach it somehow? I was thinking maybe attaching alligator clips to the ends of the light wires, would that work? I have no idea how this kind of stuff would or wouldn't work. If it does it would also be a great portable light. If this would work, would I still have to ground the light? What would I ground it to? Thanks for any input, I'd like to put these items to use.

Dc- 12 volts

Ac- 120 volts

So dc will work ac wont, as mdg stated.

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So dc will work ac wont, as mdg stated.

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If the light is AC just use a power inverter and that will make 120 AC out of 12v. DC.
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss...power+inverter
This will give you an idea of what we're talking about. The one I use has wires with alligator clips already on. The 400's have clips and a liter plug-in.

Thanks Mechanic. How do I know if its AC or DC? There is no plug on the wires coming out, just the wires with tape on the ends so I'm thinking it must have been on a ceiling at one point. So does that mean its AC? Lol, sorry for such dumb questions. I figured I would just put clips on the ends of the wires and clip those to the light but I dont want to blow anything up either if thats wrong.

Look at the bulbs. It should tell you what it is. Or look at the ballast.

If it's a 2 footer then most likely it came from under a cabinet in a kitchen. They used to make camper florescent lights but they worked the same way. They built a power inverter into the camper. I would venture a guess that it's an AC light.
Snag a power cord off an extra printer and use some yellow twist caps and connect the wires to the light and plug it into a plug-in with a smaller circuit breaker. That way if somethings wrong, it should blow the breaker fairly quick.

^^Thank you very much for the tip! I have a cord and I'm going back to my dads on thursday i will put it all together and see how it goes!