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DIANA, IN MEMORIAM
It is ten years ago precisely that Diana, The Princess of Wales died. And in memory of her life and death I thought it appropriate to include a few thoughts here on Astrolutely.com. They come in the form of a chapter in my book, Starstruck.

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The Science of Seers (Page 2 of 4)

Certainly, there is a strongly Biblical theme running through Nostradamus's quatrains, whether this was the result of his Jewish ancestry or because of the secret teachings kept by the Priory that had been handed down from the time of David.

Let me give you an example.

L'antichrist trois bien toft annichilez		The third Antichrist soon annihilates everything

Vingt & Sept ans sang durera sa guerre		twenty-seven years of blood his war will last

Les heretiques mortz, captifs, Exilez,		The unbelievers dead, captives exiled,

Sang, corps humain, eau rogie		Bloody human bodies, red water

gresler terre		covering the earth.

		Centuries VIII, q; 77

St. John's Revelations make mention of the Antichrist - remember he of the number 666. In this terrifying vision of the future, St John predicts plagues, blood, famine, war, climactic changes, upheaval, strange signs in the heavens, earthquakes - you name it it's in there - and Nostradamus's quatrains feature the same cast of characters. The unnerving factor is that many of the criteria for the End Times, are already happening. We are indeed seeing an increase in earthquake activity, we have wars and rumours of wars - take the current situation with America's sabre rattling over Iraq - we have climactic changes, false religions, and what is AIDS if not a terrible plague?

In 1555 these predictions had an unnerving effect on the general public too and Nostradamus's conveniently sized books - initially published a few hundred Centuries at a time - fitted easily into the pockets of the ruling classes. They in turn found their way by word of mouth into the lower class's consciousness as well. But what turned Nostradamus into a super star was his prediction about the King, Henri II.

Le lyon ieune le vieux surmontera		The young lion will overcome the old

En champ bellique par singulier		in a field of combat in a single fight.

Dans caige d'or les yeux luy creuera		He will pierce his eyes in a golden cage,

Deux claffes une, puis mourir, mort Cruelle		two wounds in one, then dies a cruel death.

		Centuries 1, q: 35

Three years after this quatrain was published it came horribly true.

Catherine de Medici, the wife of Henri II, had been troubled by this prediction, especially since the Italian astrologer, Luc Gauric, had already warned the King that both the beginning of his reign and the end would be marked by duels. Shortly after his accession, Henri had fought a duel - rather a risky venture for a monarch, but then Henri was an Aries - and Catherine clearly wanted to know whether the next would indeed kill him. Henry, of course, had a blind disregard for the warnings of astrologers and on the occasion of his daughter, Elizabeth's marriage to King Philip of Spain, decided to celebrate the event with a tournament. Henri was victorious during the first two days' jousting matches but on the third the lance of his opponent, the Captain of the Scottish Guard, Montgomery, pierced Henri's helmet, splintered in two, entering his brain just above the eye and lodging in his throat. Henri died in agony ten days later. To add to the accuracy of this prophecy, both Montgomery and the King featured a lion on their coat of arms.

The fulfilment of this quatrain brought Nostradamus international fame. However, he had his critics too, including doctors, philosophers, even other astrologers. Now, that couldn't be the green-eyed monster, could it? No, of course not.. His detracters even made up a neat little tongue twister about him in Latin:

Nostra damus cum falsa damus nam fallere nostrum est;
Et cum falsa damus, nil nisi notra damus.

Roughly translated this means: When we give our own we give false things. And when we give false things we give but our own. Basically it's just a play on the words notre and damus. I guess it loses a lot in the translation.

Catherine de Medici summoned Nostradamus to Court in the summer of 1556, no doubt shortly after she had read the quatrain above. To be correct it was the King who issued the summons, presumably because he believed he was humouring his wife. While further explanation of the quatrain was surely part of that first consultation, Catherine also asked Nostradamus to read the horoscopes of all her children. Then, as now, this presented a daunting task for an astrologer. And why? Well, all seven of Catherine's children were to lead tragic lives. Her eldest son, Francois, would die in his teens leaving his child bride, Mary, Queen of Scots, to her unfortunate destiny. Elisabeth, her eldest daughter, would be married to old Philip of Spain and die in childbirth. Another son would become the notorious Charles IX - somewhat unsure of his sexuality and something of a clone of Roman Emperor, Caligula - la belle Marguerite married the Huguenot King of Navarre who exiled her to a convent for her infidelity then proceeded to take over France as King Henry IV. And so it goes...

Quite how Nostradadamus got around explaining to Catherine that her thirteen-year-old son, Francois, had but four more years to live is a matter for our imagination but, as it turned out, he had already prophesied the event:

Premier fils vefue malheureux marriage		The first son, a widow an unfortunate marriage

Sans nuls enfans deux isles en discord,		without children. Two islands thrown into discord.

Auant dixhuict incompetant		Before eighteen years of age, a minor.

De l'autre pres plus bas fera l'accord.		Of the other even younger will be at one (married).

		Centuries 10 Q: 39

This quatrain is spot on. Catherine's first son, Francois, married Mary, Queen of Scots and died from a chill at the tender age of seventeen, leaving Mary a widow. Their brief marriage was childless and in the wake of Francois' death England and France were at loggerheads. The rather abstruse last stanza can be understood as Francois' brother, Charles, becoming engaged at the even younger age of eleven.

A few weeks prior to Francois' death Nostradamus made an even stronger prediction, clearly in one of his almanacs. This we understand from a letter written on 3rd December 1560 by the Tuscan Ambassador, Niccolo Tornabuoni, to Duke Cosimos of Florence:

"The health of the king is very unsure and Nostradamus in his predictions for this month says that the royal house will lose two young members from unexpected illness."

On 5th December Francois died from a chill and before the end of the month his young cousin, the son of the Duc de Roche-sur-Yon, also died from an infection.

But fame is a capricious thing. And while there is no doubt that Nostradamus continued to be held in high esteem by Catherine de Medici and countless others he was loathed by many. Indeed, by 1564 effigies of him were being burned in Paris and fearing a real roasting by the Inquisition he retired to his home in the South of France.

Nostradamus was living and working at the same time as another famous astrologer, Dr John Dee. Dee, born in 1527, was some twenty-four years younger than Nostradamus and he would have been twenty-eight when the Centuries was first published. Dee, like Nostradamus, experienced seasons of fame and success interlaced with periods of infamy and vilification.

John Dee, July 13th, 1527. 04:02pm LMT, London, England.
(Click image for enlarged view)

During the Sixteenth Century no self-respecting monarch or ruler would have been without an astrologer but however sought after such a position might be it carried certain dangers. Dee, revered as an astronomer, navigator and man of letters was forever dodging bullets at the courts of Mary Tudor and her successor, Elizabeth I. These courts, like any royal court, were infested by spies and constantly a-buzz with plots. And Dee, like any courtier, had to be careful with whom he hobnobbed - allegiances changed all the time. He narrowly escaped incarceration in the Tower of London, not because of a failed or an accurate prediction, but because he was thought to be plotting against Mary. Also, it seems that regardless of the amount of trust and belief placed in astrology a huge amount of hostility and fear was levelled at its practitioners. And while Dee was clearly a man admired for his intellectual accomplishments there was extreme concern over his dabblings in alchemy. Nevertheless Elizabeth I took him under her wing: she asked him to choose the date and time for her coronation, which he did. Crowned on the morning of January 15 1559, with Jupiter in Aquarius and Mars in Scorpio the reign of Elizabeth was indeed long, innovative and glorious. Of the many predictions he made for Elizabeth his advice on the advisability of marrying the Duke of Anjou is probably the most remembered: 'Bio-than-atos!' he is said to have replied, which is the Greek for a violent death - the Duke died of typhoid a year later.

Coronation ER I, Jan 15th, 1559. 12:00pm LMT, London, England.
(Click image for enlarged view)

To give you some idea of Dee's place in the scientific and philosophical scheme of things in many of his works his theories anticipated those that would change the shape of science a century later. He was convinced that the universe worked according to mathematical laws and although his idea that every entity in the universe emitted rays that influenced other objects was not exactly on the mark it was on the way to Newton's theory of gravity. And while in Dee's day observing celestial phenomena was done with the aid of wooden cross-staffs and rulers he was convinced that perspective-lenses - telescopes by another name - were the way forward. Telescopes were rare and expensive items in the sixteenth Century and used principally for navigation. He was indeed a man light years ahead of his time.

The Science Of Seers

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