On the eve of the New Year, astrological predictions become as relevant as possible, everyone wants to know what the coming year promises. Nostradamus has occupied the leading place in the top list of soothsayers for four centuries, it is believed that he managed to predict the future of the whole world for millennia ahead. Historians still argue about whether Michel de Notre Dame had the gift of foresight. Some see him as a prophet, while others argue that the fate of mankind can hardly be encrypted in vague quatrains.
Michel de Notre Dame was born on December 14, 1503, that is, exactly 513 years ago. He was born into an intelligent and wealthy family: his father was a notary, and both grandfathers (on the paternal and maternal side) were doctors. In the family circle, Michel received an excellent education, he studied Latin and ancient Greek, mathematics and astronomy. The guy followed in the footsteps of his relatives: he received his medical education at the University of Montpellier, began to conduct medical practice. Not trusting much the practice of bloodletting, he delves into the study of traditional medicine, successfully uses medicinal plants to treat various diseases. While still a very young doctor, he successfully helped patients during the plague in France in 1525, for which he gained fame as a true professional.
It should be noted that in medical practice Michel often resorted to the use of drugs with narcotic properties. He often experienced their actions on himself, and there is a version that in the quatrains-predictions, he often described the images he saw during hallucinations.
Michel's medical career took off, earning his Ph. D. at the age of 26, and gaining recognition for his healing practices. Michel traveled a lot and, after a while, finally decided to settle down, moved to Agen, he had a wife and children. But fate was not favorable to him: an epidemic of an unknown disease took the life of his family, Michel could not save the closest people. Needless to say, he immediately met a wave of mistrust among the local residents: how can a doctor fail to cure his wife and children? Michel had to leave.
Only a few years later, while living in Aix, he managed to restore his reputation: during a terrible plague, he invented a medicine, thanks to which many townspeople were saved. Authorities praised Michel's contribution to the rescue of Aix and gave him life support. It was then that the first-class physician began to think about drawing up astro forecasts. He did not need money, he could devote time to studying astronomy, alchemy and occult sciences.
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In fact, making predictions was a blessed business. Everyone wanted to look into the future - kings, feudal lords, and the bourgeoisie. At first, Nostradamus (Michel chose this name for himself) tried to publish annual forecasts in which he spoke of disasters, droughts, epidemics and famine. Such little books did not cause a stir, but creating them was not difficult for an educated person. The likelihood of disasters in that era was quite high.
In 1555, Nostradamus decided to master a new genre and call it "prophecy." He begins to publish anthologies with the predictions of The Century. They contain quatrains with very vague allusions to certain events. Nostradamus was sure that you need to write in such a way that even an unenlightened crowd could understand. In principle, this played into his hands: the appeal to simple images made it possible to interpret them in absolutely different ways in the future.
Perhaps one of the most striking examples of such ambiguous interpretations may be the prediction according to which "the Republic will be disturbed by new people … the whites and reds will switch places." Of course, this prophecy was seen as an omen of the Civil War in Russia, but it is enough to remember that Nostradamus called Roman soldiers red and French army soldiers white to understand how such interpretations are.
Nostradamus himself, carried away by drug experiments, seems to have believed in his visionary mission, but on this score one should not be too deluded. In addition, over the centuries, so many hoaxes have been published (in particular, Nazi ideologists are known for “finishing up” Nostradamus's predictions in the spirit of actual propaganda and scattering such leaflets over France and Belgium during the war years) that it is not always possible to find the original text …