by Nostradamus
Avant dixhuict incompetant eage,
They’ll marry off the next & younger lord.
De l’autre pres plus bas sera l’accord.
Following François’ death, France fell into years of intermittent conflict between Catholics and Protestants. As chaos reigned, some Frenchmen looked to different authorities, including Nostradamus, for guidance or insight into the next conflagration. In the late 1580s, a high-ranking official and an eminent lawyer exchanged letters about quatrain 3.55:
The year one eye over all France shall reign,
En l’an qu’un œil en France regnera,
The court shall find itself quite befuddled :
La court sera à un bien facheux trouble :
The lord from Blois shall have killed his friend,
Le grand de Bloys son amy tuera,
The realm troubled & the fears redoubled.
Le regne mis en mal & doubte double.
The official and the lawyer could not be sure what this meant, but both entertained the idea that these “magnificent verses” had predicted the recent assassination, on the king’s orders, of the ultra-Catholic Duke of Guise. The eye in the first verse referred to the monarch’s desire to oversee all happenings in France. The third verse seemed all too clear (the Duke was killed in Blois), and the fourth promised more trouble ahead. By the mid-1590s, some contemporaries took on the public mantle of Nostradamian interpreter and promised to divulge the quatrains’ hidden meanings. First among them was Nostradamus’s secretary, Jean-Aimé de Chavigny, who depicted his master as a true prophet (rather than a mere astrologer) and promised to serve his king and his readers by illuminating France’s recent past. Among the quatrains he elucidated was 6.70:
Lord of the world the great Chyren shall be,
Au chef du monde le grand Chyren sera,
Plus ultra left behind, much loved & feared :
Plus oultre après aymé, craint, redoubté :
His fame & praise shall outsurpass the skies,
Son bruit & loz les cieux surpassera,
Well pleased to be the sole victor revered.
Et du seul tiltre victeur fort contenté.
After positing that “the great Chyren” referred to Henri II (interpreters found droves of anagrams in the Prophecies), Chavigny concluded that the quatrain described the coronation of a king of unequaled fame. Like most interpreters, Chavigny picked freely from Nostradamus’s ten Centuries, jumping from one to the next. Nostradamus had never claimed, after all, that the quatrains depicted events in chronological order. While Chavigny cautiously peered into the future, he was more comfortable relating quatrains to recent events. This pattern, too, would repeat itself: confirmation proved soothing in uncertain times.
During the seventeenth century, the quatrains continued to channel the forces that shaped and transformed European politics. Some people inquired about papal deaths and elections. In 1609, various Romans and Parisians turned to 10.91:
Roman clergy, in the year sixteen nine,
Clergé Romain l’an mil six cens & neuf,
At new year’s you shall hold an election :
Au chef de l’an feras election
A gray & black monk of the Campania line,
D’un gris & noir de la Compagne yssu,
No one quite like him in dereliction.
Qui onc ne feut si maling.
This was one of only nine explicit dates in the Prophecies. The current pope, Paul V, had another twelve years to live—no papal deaths or elections in 1609—but other readers turned to Nostradamus to understand the demise of rulers. A year later, quatrain 7.17 seemed to have announced the assassination of French king Henri IV by a Catholic zealot :
The rare pity & mercy of this king
Le prince rare de pitié & clemence,
Whose death shall transform simply everything :
Viendra changer par mort grand cognoissance :
In times of great peace, the realm at ill ease,
Par grand repos le regne travaillé,
When the lord goes down to major defeat.
Lors que le grand tost sera estrillé.
Still others sought to anticipate the outcome of military operations, such as the English siege of the fortress of the city of Saint-Martin-de-Ré, on the island of Ré, off the western coast of France, in 1627. Quatrain 3.71 spelled it out :
Those trapped within isles long held under siege
Ceux dans les isles de long temps assiegez,
Shall gain vim & vigor against their foes,
Prendront vigueur, force contre ennemis :
While all those left outside, famished & weak,
Ceux par dehors mors de faim profligez,
Shall just starve to death as never before.
En plus grand faim que jamais seront mis.
This is the version of quatrain 3.71 that appeared in seventeenth-century editions of the Prophecies (slightly different from the present book’s, as explained in the notes). A French pamphleteer told the English that “the great prophet Nostradamus had warned us of your arrival. Your designs are not secret enough for the Heavens to ignore them or for the stars to keep them from astrologers.”
The quatrains had enough legitimacy to serve as ammunition in high-stakes political battles and propaganda wars. When they did not supply the desired outcome, or did not do so clearly enough, polemicists might simply pen new ones. Many seventeenth-century editions of the Prophecies quietly inserted two new quatrains at the end of the seventh Century. The content of these two quatrains varied, but the political intent was always transparent. In 1649, in the midst of the French antimonarchical revolt known as the Fronde, a pamphleteer attributed the following to Nostradamus :
When Innocent shall hold the place of Peter,
Quant Innocent tiendra le lieu de Pierre,
The Sicilian Nizaram shall see himself
Le Nizaram Cicilien se verra
In great honors, but after that shall fall
En grands honneurs, mais après il cherra
Into the quagmire of a civil war.
Dans le bourbier d’une civille guerre.
The first verse referred to the pontificate of Pope Innocent X; the second to the Italian-born Cardinal Mazarin (“Nizaram” being an anagram), principal minister of the young Louis XIV. God, one commentator explained, would maintain Cardinal Mazarin in a mire following the war he had caused. This was not the last time people would ponder forged quatrains.
Under the reign of Louis XIV (1643–1715), commentators and sycophants continued to tap Nostradamus to make sense of their world, act upon current events, imbue them with wonder, or ingratiate themselves to the king. In 1697, for instance, quatrain 7.10 was seen as a prediction of the French siege of Barcelona :
For the great prince who rules nearby Le Mans,
Par le grand prince limitrophe du Mans,
Leading his army with courage & style :
Preux & vaillant chef de grand exercite :
On land & sea of the French & Normans,
Par mer & terre de Gallotz & Normans,
Pass Gibraltar, loot Barcelona’s isle.
Calpre passer, Barcelone pillé isle.
A few years later, the author of a book entitled The Key to Nostradamus concluded from quatrain 1.92 that the Peace of Ryswick, which had ended the Nine Years’ War in 1697, would prove short-lived. France, however, would be spared further misfortune :
Under one, universal peace decreed,
Sous un la paix par tout sera clamée,
But not for long : plunder & rebellion :
Mais non long temps pille & rebellion :
Defiant city stormed by land & sea :
Par refus ville, terre, & mer entamée :
Dead or captured, a third of a million.
Mors & captifz le tiers d’un million.
If any country had cause for concern, this commentator added, it was Great Britain. Quatrain 2.68 said so clearly :
The northern army shall be great
in size,
De l’aquilon les efforts seront grands :
The door to the Ocean shall open wide :
Sus l’Occean sera la porte ouverte :
The throne shall be recovered on the isle,
Le regne en l’isle sera reintegrand,
London tremble when the sails are espied.
Tremblera Londres par voille descouverte.
Few quatrains have been interpreted more often or linked to more events over the decades. In 1744, for instance, the Parisian lawyer Edmond Barbier wrote in his diary that the northern army in the first verse denoted the French fleet, which had sailed out to engage British warships near Toulon. If Nostradamus was to be believed, Barbier wrote, they would triumph (they did).
While the Prophecies retained a special allure in France, their posterity extended to neighboring countries. Individual quatrains circulated in Great Britain long before the first full translation of 1672. With its revolutions and regicides, its natural calamities and mighty wars, Great Britain witnessed an astrological and prophetic outpouring in the seventeenth century, and Nostradamus found a home across the Channel. First came the civil war and the beheading of King Charles I in 1649. The famed astrologer William Lilly, who sided with Parliament, declared that kings would never again rule over England. How could one doubt it when Nostradamus had predicted the regicide? Here it was in quatrain 9.49:
Ghent & Brussels shall march against Antwerp,
Gand & Bruceles marcheront contre Envers
The senate of London its king shall slay :
Senat de Londres mettront à mort leur roy
Wine & salt contribute to his reverse,
Le sel & vin luy seront à l’envers,
Thus throwing the realm into disarray.
Pour eux avoir le regne en desarroy.
The quatrain’s second verse received considerable attention following Charles’s execution. Supporters of the king read it as a comment on what one of them called “the shameful and cruel demise of the King of England.” A few years later, contemporaries pointed to quatrain 10.22 as evidence of Oliver Cromwell’s usurpation and tyranny :
Unwilling to consent to a divorce
Pour ne vouloir consentir au divorce,
Which afterward might be deemed unseemly,
Qui puis apres sera cogneu indigne,
The king of the Isles shall be forced to flee :
Le roy des Isles sera chassé par force
Instead, a king whom no mark does endorse.
Mis à son lieu que de roy n’aura signe.
The quatrains remained in the public eye following the demise of the Protectorate in 1659 and the restoration of the monarchy. In 1665, a plague epidemic killed thousands in London—perhaps one-fifth of the city’s population. The Prophecies had long been linked to such natural calamities, and they remained so at this time, with politics in the mix. Quatrain 2.53 came under scrutiny :
The mighty plague in the city by the sea
La grande peste de cité maritime
Shall not end until the death is avenged
Ne cessera que mort ne soit vengée
Of innocent blood unjustly condemned :
De juste sang par pris damné sans crime :
The great dame outraged by the knavery.
De la grand dame par feincte n’outraigée.
Theophilus de Garencières, who had not only translated the Prophecies into English in 1672 but also provided commentaries, explained that the quatrain had foretold the epidemic and explained its causes. In his reading of these verses, the plague would not end until Charles had been avenged. The king (or juste sang, which he translated as “just blood”) had been condemned without committing a crime while the sumptuous Cathedral of St. Paul (“the great dame”) had been “polluted and made a stable by those prophane wretches.” These were Garencières’s own words.
The plague was followed by the devastating Great Fire of London, which lasted three days in 1666 and destroyed much of the medieval quarter. The pertinent quatrain (2.51) circulated in popular almanacs and created a stir at posh dinner parties :
No blood of the just shall be spilled in London :
Le sang du juste à Londres fera faulte :
Six times twenty-three consumed by lightning :
Bruslés par fouldres de vint & trois les six :
The ancient dame shall fall from high station :
La dame antique cherra de place haute :
Many of the same sect shall lose their lives.
De mesme secte plusieurs seront occis.
Three times twenty (vint & trois) added to six (les six) came out to sixty-six, the year 1666. The “dame” referred again to St. Paul’s. The last verse, however, posed difficulties. While some believed that the members of the “same sect” were worshippers of the Sun and the planets, Garencières insisted that the verse denoted the many churches involved in “the same woeful conflagration.” It was all about divine punishment and expiation—an apocalyptic strand that resonated in seventeenth-century Britain and would grow more preeminent in later readings of the Prophecies. By this time, some Britons were also mulling over the very suggestive quatrain 3.57:
Seven times you’ll see the British people change,
Sept fois changer verrez gent Britannique,
Stained with blood, in two hundred ninety years,
Tainte en sang en deux cens nonante an,
Not that they’ll be free, under German sway :
Franche non point, par apuy Germanique :
Bastarnian climes being what Aries fears.
Aries doubte son pole Bastarnan.
The quatrain seemed to encompass all the upheavals afflicting Great Britain. Commentators tried to tabulate how many such “changes” had already occurred and how many lay in store. This quatrain resurfaced in 1845, a momentous date for Great Britain if one added 1555 and the 290 years mentioned in the second verse. Fraser’s Magazine for Town and Country discussed the matter at length before declaring, perhaps tongue-in-cheek, that “we hope it bodes no evil.” The year 1845 witnessed a catastrophic bridge collapse in Great Yarmouth and the loss of Sir John Franklin’s expedition to the Northwest Passage, not to mention the start of the Great Famine in Ireland.
Back in the seventeenth century, the Fronde, the plague, and the Fire of London had set precedents. When they anticipated or encountered turmoil, residents of France and England and other European countries kept turning to the Prophecies, which now seemed ancient, mysterious, and reputable. To be sure, the quatrains faded from view during the eighteenth century: reason, science, and worldly decorum did not grant them a place at the table. But they never disappeared altogether. In France, the rapid ascent and collapse of Scottish financier John Law’s Banque Générale drew attention to quatrain 1.53 around 1720:
Alas one shall see a great nation bleed
Las qu’on verra grand peuple tourmenté,
And the holy law & all of Christendom
Et la Loy saincte en totale ruine
Reduced to utter ruin by other creeds,
Par autres loix toute Chrestienté,
Each time a new gold, silver mine is found.
Quand d’or, d’argent trouvé nouvelle mine.
The lure of gold and silver (which Law promised to deliver through his scheme in Louisiana) was indeed making France bleed. Meanwhile, Italians paid attention to quatrain 3.35 in the early 1730s :
At Europe’s farthermost western reaches,
Du plus profond de l’Occident d’Europe,
To poor folk a small infant shall be born :
De pauvres gens un jeune enfant naistra :
He shall seduce great crowds with his speeches,
Qui par sa langue seduira grande trope,
His great fame spreading to Orient shores.
Son bruit au regne d’Orient plus croistra.
Here was a prediction about the birth of an infant, born of Philip V of Spain, who would attain great fame. In Tuscany, where t
he duke Gian Gastone de’ Medici was childless, some concluded that the infant would eventually rule the Grand Duchy.
Someone had altered the original French in small but pivotal ways in order to make the quatrain more pertinent. In the second verse, De pauves gens un jeune enfant naistra became De doubles noces un jeune enfant naîtra (From a double marriage a small infant shall be born)—a reference to Philip’s second marriage. In the third verse, Qui par sa langue seduira became Qui vers le Po mènera grande troupe (who would bring a large army to the Po). Nostradamus’s international score lent itself to regional variations.
Then came the French Revolution. In the midst of this modern revolution, with its breathless pace of change and its mounting violence, people turned to the Prophecies to gain a grip on time and politics and events that were at once wondrous and sinister. Some revolutionaries pointed early on to quatrain 2.10:
Before too long all things shall be ordained :
Avant long temps le tout sera rangé:
We sense a sinister age on its way :
Nous esperons un siecle bien senestre :
The state of marks & seals shall be most changed :
L’estat des marques & des scelz bien changé:
Few to be found content with their stations.
Peu trouveront qu’à son rang vueille estre.
The quatrain referenced prerevolutionary discontent and promised that unrest would end soon. Opponents, in contrast, marshaled quatrains such as 3.50:
