MOTHER SHIPTON
Mother Shipton's Prophecy - predicting trains, telegraphs, submarines, steam engines, balloons, bicycles, America and the California gold rush - was written by Charles Hindley in 1862, when those things were universally known. Hindley's prophecy also has Shipton foreseeing the world ending in 1881. This, by most accounts, didn't happen. So that line was dropped from later editions. By 1931, anonymous innovators replaced the 1881 prophecy with a prediction of 1920's fashion and the nuclear family. By 1933, the angel Gabriel was included and the specific end-time date was now manageably obscure. A 1944 version foretells movies, airplanes, world wars and the American civil war.
In 2002, a Weekly World News article added several new prophecies, including global catastrophe and a flying saucer apocalypse. The author, Mike Foster, was known for other WWN scoops such as "Bat Boy Is Learning to Talk" (1998), "Bat Boy Abandons Stolen Car" (2003) and "Bat Boy Led U.S. Troops to Saddam" (2004). Still, his contributions to the Mother Shipton poem are cited to this day by people who believed them to be the words of a prophet.
NOSTRADAMUS
"The key to the hidden prediction which you will inherit will be locked inside my heart," he told his son, Cesar, in a letter.
In another letter, to King Henry in 1558, the prophet admits, "There is no making way through [most of the quatrains], nor is there any interpreting of them."
He didn't see visions or hear voices; he merely calculated events he believed would occur in future astronomical alignments and conjunctions based on his own (or someone else's) horoscopes of European history, and his personal conviction that history is destined to repeat itself, following a biblical eschatological framework.
The letter to Cesar continues:
"Bear in mind that the events here described have not yet come to pass, and that all is ruled and governed by the power of Almighty God, inspiring us not by bacchic frenzy nor by enchantments but by astronomical assurances...I have predicted specific events far in advance, attributing all to the workings of divine power and inspiration, together with other fortunate or unfortunate happenings, foreseen in their full unexpectedness, which have already come to pass in various regions of the earth."
Here are a few of his supposed predictions:
DEATH OF HENRY II, 1559
The golden cage prophecy doesn't appear in print until 1566. In 1560, an author cites two other quatrains, but not the golden cage. The first citation of the golden cage is in the edition published by Cesar, the son of Nostradamus, in 1614.
LONDON FIRE OF 1666
A postdiction of the fate of Queen of England Mary I, a.k.a. Bloody Mary (d. 1558), who had burned 280 Protestants at the stake during her reign. The first English editions - published in 1672 & 1715 - deliberately mistranslate the French text to resemble the London fire.
FRENCH REVOLUTION
The original quatrains were based on the horoscopes of previous French conflicts. Any resemblance to future French conflict is purely coincidental.
NAPOLEON
"Pau, Nay, Loron": supposedly an anagram for Napaulon Roy. But "Napaulon" is not "Napoleon." When letters are substituted and spellings approximated, anagrams can be made to fit any desired person or event. Pau, Nay and Loron are French cities. Nostradamus would often list cities, rivers and planets in his quatrains, probably for the sake of meter as much as any other consideration.
Rearrange the letters and you get *Paul a roy non* (Loosely: "Paul will not become king") - could apply to Prince Paul of Wurrtemberg (d. 1852) or Prince Paul of Yugoslavia (d. 1976), or Sir Paul McCartney of Liverpool, or Ron and Rand Paul's failed presidential runs in the early 21st century. Or it could be just nonsense.
LOUIS PASTUER
Nostradamus doesn't mention Louis Pastuer, only a pastor, which, in French, is "pastuer."
HITLER
1. "Hister" is the Latin name for the Danube river
2. "Child of Germany" may refer to a Protestant leader, as the Reformation - born in Germany - is a frequent topic of the quatrains, composed during the French Wars of Religion
3. Hitler was born in Austria, not Germany
KENNEDY ASSASSINATIONS
"The great man will be struck down in the day by a thunderbolt.
An evil deed, foretold by the bearer of a petition.
According to the prediction another falls at night time.
Conflict at Reims, London, and pestilence in Tuscany."
1. No mention of guns, presidents, brothers, America or a car.
2. No indication that "night time" would be five years later, as opposed to the same day, or the following Tuesday.
3. There wasn't a "bearer of a petition" predicting anything.
4. There wasn't any notable conflict in Reims or London or a pestilence in Tuscany in the 1960s or 70s.
NEW YORK DESTROYED
"At 45 degrees the sky will burn."
1. NYC is on the 42nd parallel, not the 45th. Lyon and Milan are on the 45th parallel. These make frequent appearances elsewhere in Nostradamus' quatrains.
2. Forty-five angular degrees of elevation is the middle of the sky, where "burning" meteors, comets, planets and the sun are commonly found.
MODERN ADDITIONS
Recent forgeries "predict" (after-the-fact):
Challenger shuttle disaster, 1986
Jane Fonda, Ted Turner marriage, 1991
OJ Simpson trial, 1995
Death of Princess Diana, 1997
Bush election, 2000
September 11 attacks, 2001
Columbia shuttle disaster, 2003
Covid-19 pandemic, 2020
DECODING NOSTRADAMAS
*Antichrists* = Protestant leaders
*Hollow mountains* = volcanoes of southern Italy
*King of terror in the sky* = comet
*Sky will burn at 45 degrees*: a comet will be seen
*King of terror in the sky, 1999: the appearance of the comet of 1577 (~1999 in the Metonic calendar).
NOSTRADAMUS TIMELINE
1555 Les Proph ed. 1: 3 cent., 53 quatrains
1555 Les Proph ed. 2: some changes
1557 Les Proph ed. 3: adds 3 quatrains
1558 Death of Mary I
1559 Death of Henry II
1566 Death of M. Nostradamus
1568 Les Proph ed. 4: all ten cent., HII letter
1577 comet
1605 68 2nd ed. Rigaud
1607 comet
1629 Death of C. Nostradamus
1664 Comet
1666 London fire
1672 1st Eng translation
1715 J Roberts: changes foudres (lightning) to fond (background) to say London was "burnt to the ground in the year 6 after 60."
1983 Dr. Fontbrune/Lykiard
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