 |
|
|---|
|
|
|---|
Des sept rameaulx à trois seront reduicts,
Les plus aisnes seront surprins par mort,
Fratricider les deux seront seduictz,
Les conjurez en dormans seront morts.
The key to this quatrain is the seven who are the seven children of Henri II and Catherine de Medici.
When this quatrain starts, four of the seven are dead or removed from the scene. Claude had died a few months after her brother, Charles IX. The eldest sister Elizabeth had died in childbirth a few years earlier. And Francis II, the eldest brother, was long dead. The only ones left alive are Henri III de France, Frances duc de Alençon and Margot the wife of Henri de Navarre. Henri III wanted peace, yet no king who wanted peace could successfully rule France at this time: The Religious Wars were raging in full fury, the sides were too full of hate, too warlike in intentions for peace to be successful. It is true that there was a faction of Catholics who preferred religious toleration, known as Les Politicals, it was headed by the Duc de Alençon. However, the Guise brothers who headed the Catholic League, conspired against the King, hated the Huguenots and despised the Politicals. The Huguenots, lead by Henri de Navarre were fighting with every shred of honor and valor they could muster.
It was brother against brother in the struggle between Henri III and Alençon. It was also Valois, Bourbon and Lorraine in a three way struggle where the Guise brothers and Henri de Navarre were concerned. Alençon would be the first of the three to die in 1584, but the eldest of the three, Henri, would be assassinated in 1589, much to his surprise. The two conspirators who were asleep were the Guise brothers of the House of Lorraine, to their surprise they were killed by Henri III in 1588. The two fratriciders were the Duc and the King, both of whom wanted to kill each other. King Henri simply got his blow in first.
Dresser copies mouter à l’Empire,
Du Vatican le sang Royal tiendra :
Flamans, Angolis, Espaigne avec Aspire,
Contre l’Italie & France contendra.
The first two lines talks about Napoléon. He was the leader of armies that he constantly raised, and eventually had himself crowned as Emperor. The Vatican became his possession and he imprisoned two popes. The Flemish refers to the Netherlanders, the English to the British. The Spanish, a supporter of Napoléon, turned against him almost to a man once he tried to depose their king, Charles IV and his son, Ferdinand VII, replacing them with his brother Joseph Bonaparte. Italy was occupied by the French during most of the Napoléonic wars and was either part of France or was a French playground.
Un dubieux ne viendra loing du regne,
La plus grand part le voudra soustenir :
Un Capitole ne voudra point qu’il regne,
Sa grande charge ne pourra maintenir.
That Louis is the wavering one is beyond a doubt. In his first years in power, 1774-1789, he tried several different prime ministers, each of whom he ended up dismissing. Unable to decide on a lasting and successful policy, he drifted into depression, finally convoking the Estates General in 1789. This resulted in the National Assembly and the beginning of the French Revolution.
The nation as a whole was prepared to support the existence of the king. The National Assembly at first also agreed. Yet Louis was indecisive, he was unable to maintain his charge, governing the country. His wife ended up making most of the decisions, including the disastrous decision to flee the country. This resulted in his capture in Varennes which doomed the king. Eventually the new government, the Assembly, decided that he should be disposed of.
Loing de sa terre Roy perdra la bataille,
Prompt eschappé poursuiuy suivant prins,
Ignare prins soubs la doree maille.
Soubs fainct habit & l’ennemy surprins.
The first two lines of the quatrain make this relatively easy to figure out. A king, or forceful political leader, fighting far from his land, loses a battle. He manages to escape his enemy, but somehow he is discovered, followed and later captured. The traditional translation of the third line is gold mail instead of gold mesh. The last line is hard to understand until the first two are known.
This refers to Karl XII of Sweeden and what happened to him during his Russian invasion and Turkish exile during the Great Northern War. Karl had invaided Russia with a strong force. Peter the Great and Karl fought several battles, Karl winning most of them but Peter winning peripheral battles. The climatic battle at Poltavia was fought far from Karl’s home – Karl lost.
Retreating south, he sought refuge with the Sultan of Turkey. He was a royal visitor on a fixed income, but his constant inciting of war between the Turks and the Russians soon wearied the Turkish population. During a popular uprising, the Janissaries, the feared infantry of the Turks, captured and imprisoned Karl – likely this was done by order of the Sultan, Ahmed III. Karl would stay a total of 3 years in Ottoman hands before he escaped and returned to Sweden.
Karl’s escape was likely a surprise to the Turks, it was definitely a surprise to the forces arrayed against the Swedes. However, by this time the war was all but settled; Karl failed to turn the tides of the war.
Dessoubz la tombe sera trouvé le Prince,
Qu'aura le pris par dessus Nuremberg :
L'espaignol Roy en capricorne mince,
Feinct & trahy par le grand Vutitemberg.
There is a Spanish king again, Juan Carlos I, he was born January 5th, with the sun in the sign of Capricorn, so this could refer to him. However, I have my doubts. Historical Spanish kings born in Capricorn are Charles III, who was born on 20th of January, 1716 and Joseph Bonaparte, born 7th of January, 1768.
If it is fulfilled, the most likely candidate is Joseph Bonaparte. The tomb would be that of Louis XVI, the prince would be Napoléon, whose “aura” extended over all of Europe, including the Confederation of the Rhine, which included Nuremberg.
The problem with any interpretation is Vutitemberg, which is obviously modified to rhyme with Nuremberg.
Ce que ravy sera du jeune Milve,
Par les Normans de France & Picardie :
Les noirs du temple du lieu de Negrisilue,
Feront aulberge & feu de Lombardie.
I could not find a direct translation of Milve, so I used a variant of Theophilus de Garenciéres who translated it into a young kite. A kite in this circumstance is a type of a large hawk, so I used the term hawk in the translation. The Black Forest is in Germany. The blacks could refer to the SS, but then who is the young Hawk? And why Lombardy? I cannot figure out what it means.
Apres les limes bruslez les asiniers,
Contraints seront changer habits divers :
Les Saturnins bruslez par les meusniers,
Hors la pluspart qui ne seront couvers.
Ass-drivers could be literal or it could be figurative. The Saturnians is, of course, descriptive. In both mythology and astrology, Saturn rules time, destruction, structure, patience and long lasting plans. Put as simply as I can understand it, the ass drivers refers to the Nobility who considered the common people and the peasantry to be the equivalent of asses. The events of the revolution forced to change their metaphorical clothes, in other words change their political stances. The Saturnians would then refer to the Religious Orders, all of whom engaged in long range plans. They were burned by the common people, represented here by the millers, though not by all for a large portion of the common people do not see the religious orders as being evil.
This explanation leads quite handily to the fury of the French Revolution.
Par les phisiques le grand Roy delaissé,
Par sort non art de l'Ebrieu est en vie,
Luy & son genre au regne haut poussé,
Grace donnee à gent qui Christ envie.
Towards the end of the Second World War, Adolf Hitler, the great king of this quatrain (a note on his power, which was kinglike) was abandoned by many of his own people. Claus von Stauffenburg tried to assassinate him by planting a bomb in a briefcase near the legs of the Furher, but fate, in the guise of a German general who wanted to stretch his legs, moved the fatal briefcase to a position where the table leg would shield the blast from Adolf Hitler.
Later that day, showing the damage to his friend Benito Mussolini, he declared that he was convinced that fate had kept him for a sublime and important purpose.
The race that envied Christ is the Hebrew race. They envied Christ because wherever they went, they were treated as second class citizens. The sheer horror of the Holocaust caused many people to rethink their attitude towards Jews.
La vraye flamme engloutira la dame,
Que voudra mettre les Innocens à feu :
Pres de l'assaut l'exercite s'enflamme,
Quant dans Seuille monstre en boeuf sera veu.
The true flame has to be Catholicism. Nothing else can possibly make sense. The lady is most likely the Second Spanish Republic, though what the innocents are I have no idea. Seville was the scene where Francisco Franco landed and was his first conquest during the Spanish Civil War. The army blazing would naturally refer to the furious fighting that occurred during the Civil War. The last line has a reference to the forces of Adolf Hitler. As Hitler was a Taurean, the sign of the Bull, he was the monster in beef. His air forces were seen in Spain assisting Franco.
L’union faincte sera peu de durée,
Des uns changés reformés la pluspart :
Dans les vaisleaux sera gent endurée,
Lors aura Rome un nouveau liepart.
The vessels are most likely nations, though it could refer to the Churches of the Papacy. The last part about Rome having a new leopard would fit with this referring to the Catholic Church.
The closest event I can come to deals with the union between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. It is true that at this time there had been a new pontiff, Pius XII. It is also true that Pius would be the first to initiate some needed reforms in the Catholic Church. However, the part about the vessels does not seem to agree with this interpretation.