NOSTRADAMUS (MICHEL DE NOTREDAME)

Nostradamus, a renowned French physician, astrologer, and prophet in his own time, is best remembered for hisCenturies, a collection of astrological predictions in rhymed quatrains. His predictions earned him the favor of Kings Henri II and Charles IX of France, as well as a solid place in their employment.

Michel de Notredame was born in St. Remi to a family of Jewish descent that had converted to Roman Catholicism. He studied in Avignon and received his medical degree in 1529 at the prestigious University of Montpellier. During his early practice he met the famed humanist Julius Caesar Scaliger* in Agen, where he eventually settled and married. After the death of his wife and two children, most likely of the plague, he returned to his native Provence.He lived in Aix, receiving a salary from the city for his services during the plague of 1546. As a physician, his ministrations during the outbreaks of plague in Aix and Lyons were renowned; the formula for his remedy for the plague survives to this day. He later traveled to Salon de Craux, where he married for the second time and had more children.

In 1555 his propheticCenturieswas published, and the following year he was invited to the court of Henri II and Catherine de' Medici.* The queen later sent him to the Chateau de Blois to predict her children's future. He reportedly told her that all of her sons would be kings, a prediction that would turn out to be partially true, in that three of the four princes would successively become king of France.

There are several other legendary predictions that would eventually prove to be true. A stanza in Nostradamus's Centuries predicted that King Henri II would die in a joust; four years later Henri died after being pierced through the eye during a jousting tournament, as Nostradamus had written. Another famous tale involves Nostradamus kneeling before an undistinguished young monk and ad­dressing him prophetically as His Holiness. In fact, the young monk would indeed go on to become Pope Sixtus V. These anecdotes aside, there is still not enough evidence to prove whether Nostradamus was a true prophet or a char­latan.

Nostradamus retired in 1557 to his home in Salon. In 1564 Charles IX ap­pointed him royal physician and provided him with a pension; two years later Nostradamus died quietly in his sleep. He was looked upon as an oracle by many of the noble and educated people of his time and was greatly respected for his supernatural knowledge.

P. Brind'Amour, Nostradamus Astrophile, 1993.

C. Ward, Oracles of Nostradamus, 1940.