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Roy tourera ce qu’il destroit tant,
Quand le Prelat sera reprins à tort :
Responce au duc le rendra mal content,
Qui dans Milan merra plusieurs à mort.
The King is Victor Emmanuel III of Italy. The Prelate is Pope Pius XII. The Duke is Il Duce Benito Mussolini. Around these characters the quatrain unfolds.
It is almost certain that Victor Emmanuel III never liked Mussolini. He resisted allowing him into power for a while, acceding to Mussolini’s demands only after the 1922 March on Rome. That said, it is evident that the King did not hide his delight on Mussolini’s successes, especially in Ethiopia and Albania. Nevertheless, the King was a weak willed man, all power rested with Il Duce. Yet by 1943, the situation had changed. Mussolini’s power was waning. The United Nation forces had completed the conquest/liberation of North Africa. Powerful forces were preparing to attack Sicily. The Grand Council of Fascism had convened and had forcefully rejected Mussolini, requesting the King to resume his full constitutional powers. Mussolini was alone, nobody in Italy, save his mistress Clara Petacci, was for him. It was the time, way past time, for the King to act.
The Papacy of Pius XII was troubled and the troubles came from stands the Pope took during the Second World War up to that time. Yes, he had taken some noble stands. In the face of Mussolini’s anti-Jewish laws, he deliberately hired Jews to work in the Vatican. He condemned the invasion and occupation of Poland in 1939 by the Nazis and Soviets. He condemned the Soviet Union in 1940 for its attack on Finland. He condemned the Nazi killing of Polish citizens in 1940. He spoke out against the Jewish extermination campaign in 1940, emphasizing it in 1942. And it must be stated that he did order the Catholic Churches and institutions in Italy to hide Jews after the Nazis had taken over most of the country. Yet he was largely silent to the other oppressions against the Jews, responding to Philippe Petain that the Church was not opposed to every law against the Jews. And it seems that his attitude was largely driven by the fact that from the middle of 1942 onward it was obvious that the Allied forces of the British, Americans and Soviets were going to win the war. Nostradamus calls the accusations made against Pius wrong, perhaps they are. Still, we can only go by what we see and know. It could be that a lot of the indifference the Pope gave was due to political reasons – the Vatican was located inside Rome and was relatively defenseless. Because of this, we can never know.
The King found a worthy successor, Marshal Pietro Badoglio, who would be able to sign an armistice with the Allied countries. Then, he invited Mussolini to the Royal Palace. There, he announced to the Duce that Mussolini was now the most hated person in all Italy. The king promised to protect the Duce, a deliberate lie as he had no intention of protecting Mussolini. This dissatisfied Mussolini, but as there was nothing he could do about it, he complied with the wishes of the King. He really had no other choice.
Mussolini would later be rescued by Hitler and set up in the Italian Socialist Republic. There he officiated over the execution of many opponents throughout Italy, including Milan, completing the quatrain.
Par trahysons de verges gens à mort battu,
Prins surmonté sera par son desordre :
Conseil frivole au grand caprif sentu,
Nez par fureur quant Berich viendra mordre.
The first line confuses me completely, but it is the best translation I can come up with. Theophilus de Garenciéres translated it as “By treason people beaten to death with rods,” which makes more sense, yet I cannot help but feel that he was forcing the word verges in the first line. Still, he knew ancient French far better than I do so he could be right.
Who or what Berich is I have no idea. Is it a real name, or an anagram?
I must leave this quatrain to the reader to figure out.
Sa main derniere par Alus sanguinaire,
Ne se pourra par la mer guarentir :
Entre deux fleuves craindre main militaire,
Le noir l'ireux le fera repentir.
Where and who is unknown. The key is the word Alus. It could be a name, it could be an anagram. One possible anagram is that it could be spelled backwards – Sula, an important Iranian city. Only the future can tell.
De feu volant la machination,
Viendra troubler au grand chef assiegez :
Dedans sera telle sedition,
Qu’en desespoir seront les profligez.
The “device of flying fire” is an apt description of a modern day rocket. Launching under a great gust of fire, the rocket is hurled upward into the sky at an incredible acceleration. Then, the fuel exhausted, the rocket tips over and descends towards its target. The warhead explodes either on contact with the ground or based on more complicated mechanics.
This accurately describes the position of the World War in 1944. Hitler and the Germans, the profligate (destitute and reckless) ones, had started the attack in a vain and foolish attempt to turn the tide of the war. Winston Churchill was the besieged chief, having been so since 1940 when Britain stood alone against the full might of the Nazi war machine. Publicly Churchill took a brave face, asserting that the British people did not mind the attacks, enabling them to share to some small degree the dangers the brave troops faced on the front. Yet it did not stop him from requesting that the troops on the front hurry it up and conquer the launching spots so as to end the threat against the British civilians. Within Germany there was complete discord and dissolution. The bomb plot of Count Claus von Stauffenberg had failed and the resulting wave of reprisals had not only killed Stauffenberg, but also Germany’s noblest and ablest warrior, Field Marshal Rommel, who had by that time become so thoroughly disgusted with Hitler that he had signed on with the plot. Himmler and Goering were acting in their own warped interests, breaking away from Hitler. The army was in a state of disintegration. The Luftwaffe was weak and ineffective. Only the Navy continued on, and its power was completely blunted. Despair ruled in Nazi circles.
Pres de Rion, & proche à blanche laine,
Aries, Taurus, Cancer, Leo, la Vierge,
Mars, Jupiter, le Sol ardra grand plaine,
Bois & citez, lettres cachez au cierge.
Rion is the ancient spelling of modern day Rio, in Greece. The timing given is Aries, Taurus, Cancer, Leo and Virgo (the Virgin). The period of the sun in these signs is approximately March 20th -May 20th, then June 20th - September 20th. An ephemeris would be needed to determine when Mars and Jupiter are in those signs. The rest is not understandable by me. This likely refers to the future.
Ne bien ne mal par bataille terrestre,
Ne paruiendra aux confins de Perouse,
Rebeller Pise, Florence voir mal estre,
Roy nuict blessé sur mulet à noire house.
The black house is the key to this quatrain. Mussolini’s fascists were the original black shirts, predating even the Gestapo of Adolf Hitler. Perouse is a small region in France near the Swiss border. Many translators translate it, it is Perugia, central Italy. Either way, this quatrain fits Mussolini. However, this change in cities results in different interpretations. Because it is fulfilled either way, I will give both possibilities.
If it is Perugia, as the translators believe (because it does fit with the third line), then it refers to Mussolini’s rise to power. The king who was wronged would be Victor Emanuel III who, thanks to Mussolini, had no chance to build a better government. Pisa and Florence were early seats of Fascist activity. The terrestrial battle was the fierce battles between the Black Shirts of the Fascists and the Socialists and the Communists.
If it is indeed Perouse as I believe, then this has to refer to the last years of his life. The mention of Perouse would therefore refer to the year 1944, during the height of the furious assaults during the end of the war. The allied forces swept through Perouse during the second half of this year. Mussolini was a puppet governor of the Italian Social Republic, officially in power but in reality ruling at the whim of Adolf Hitler. The king is still Victor Emanuel III, this time wronged not by Mussolini’s ascension to power, but by his maintaining official (if illusory) power with German arms in northern Italy. Pisa and Florence were actively seeking to end the life of Mussolini, and Florence saw much turmoil during this time.
L’œuvre ancienne se paracheuera,
Du toict cherra sur le grand mal ruyne :
Innocent faict mort on accusera:
Nocent caiché taillis à bruyne.
Note: Nocent could be an accidental shortening of Innocent or it could refer to something different.
This quatrain could refer to the Nazis and the Holocaust. The innocent ones, the Jews who were killed, were blamed for their own wickedness. Yet the ancient work, the hatred of the Jews, was finished. The Nazis extinguished it in a final furious blaze of horror, before the ruin from the sky’s (the allied victory was mainly due to their absolute control of the air). However, the key to this quatrain lies in the correct interpretation of Nocent in line 4.
Aux profligez de paix les ennemis,
Apres avoir l’Italie superce :
Noir sanguinaire, rogue sera commis,
Feu, sang verser, eaue de sang couloree.
The key to this quatrain is the fact that the rogue, or red, will be made after Italy has been overcome. This places us right into the wars of the first and second coalition, after Napoléon had been so successful in Italy before he became First Consul.
The only problem with the translation is in the fourth line. The originals have it: Feu, sang verser, eaue de sang couloree. With the exception of eaue, it is easy to translate. But water is eau, not eaue. Therefore, I am uncertain about this one word.
That said, the third line is so obviously Napoléon that the quatrain can refer to nobody else. Noir and rogue together (either black and rogue or black and red) is one of the descriptions that refers to Napoléon himself.
This refers to the Coup of 18 Brumaire. It was the event where Napoléon overthrew the Directory and the National Assembly, or what was left of the two bodies. The Consulate was established. Napoléon quickly became First Consul. He was an enemy of peace, preferring to impose the ideals of the Revolution upon an unwilling Europe, a Europe that was just as willing to raise arms and crush him and the principles of the Revolution in order to protect their own reactionary monarchial system.
L’enfant du regne par paternelle prinse,
Expolié sera pour delivrer :
Aupres du lac Trasimen l’azur prinse,
La troupe hostaige pour trop fort s’enyurer.
Prinse could be prisoner, as Theophilus de Garenciéres thought it was, or it could be prince, i.e. a prince of the kingdom. It could also be both. The rest of the quatrain I can not make any headway with.
Grand de Magonce pour grande soif estaindre,
Sera privé de la grand dignité :
Ceux de Cologne si fort le viendront plaindre,
Que le grand groppe au Ryn fera getté.
Magonce is ambiguous; several different interpretations have been given to it, but I am uncertain about all of them. Only Cologne and the Rhine are obvious. The second line is curious. Most translators translate it as Garencieres did: Will be deposed from his great dignity. I admit, it fits the flavor of the quatrain as we understand it, but Nostradamus used privé, which directly translates to private or quiet, it does not translate into deposed. For this reason, my own translation is somewhat different from everyone else’s.