 |
|
|---|
|
|
|---|
Very rarely do those who have an interest in Nostradamus discuss the times in which he lived. This is actually quite normal, because many of the people who read about his life in the past had a basic understanding of the times that Michael lived in. But to us, approximately six hundred years after the fact, it takes on an aura of unreality. I am therefore going to give a brief description of Europe at the time Michael Nostradamus, Michel de Nostradame, was born.
Italy dominated Europe. Italy dominated the trade scene: Italian merchantmen were crossing the Mediterranean Sea, collecting the merchandise of India and China and selling them in various ports of Western Europe. Italy also dominated the artistic scene: music and art were all primarily Italian. Italians were also at the forefront of great strides in knowledge, the works of Plato and Aristotle had been reintroduced into Italy and the result was an adventurist and inquisitive focus that was bringing the Medieval period to a close. But most importantly Italy was the home of the Papacy, the official head of not only the Catholic Church but the titular head of about half of Europe.
Kings chaffed at the restrictions the Papacy imposed, all claimed that they ruled their lands, but none of them wanted to risk the disaster that Heinrich IV of the Holy Roman Empire endured when he tried to assert royal prerogative against the Church. All monarchs remembered how Pope Gregory VII all but destroyed Heinrich by simply excommunicating him, they remembered how the people had simply abandoned Heinrich out of fear of the power of the Church, forcing Heinrich to seek forgiveness. Because of the “hidden, spiritual” weapons that the people believed the Papacy had, kings dared not go too far against the Pope for fear of excommunication and a crusade. Though the French had nominal liberty to do what they wanted to, a gift by the Papacy to Charlemagne and his descendants, even French kings had to consider the wishes of the Pope for the Pope could still easily excommunicate the monarch and call a crusade to remove the monarch from power, completely restoring papal control over France. Heinrich had to stand in the biting wind for several days before the Pope forgave him yet he and his descendants lost forever the "Gift to Charlemagne," their ability to go their own way or to influence the Papacy, in the Germanic lands. No king wanted to risk the same disaster. That said, the Papacy was mostly interested in religious power, they did not care much about temporal power except over their own Papal States. Pope Gregory had asserted his power over Heinrich because Heinrich tried to take Church property, a very unwise move at the time. But otherwise the Church tended to ignore temporal power. By abdicating this basic authority, the Church inadvertently gave kings tremendous temporal power that paved the way for the eventual overthrow of the Church.
“Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” These wise words of Lord Acton found fulfillment in the Catholic Church of the 1500’s. Terrible abuses were being practiced. The church, which was supposed to be the home of mercy to the poor and succor to those in need had become a repository of greed and vice, supporting its own power and even siding with the nobility to keep the poor and downtrodden in line. Money poured into papal and bishopric coffers through donations, church taxes and the sales of indulgences. Church positions, especially bishoprics, were for sale to the sons of nobles for a goodly sum to the papacy. Great churches and monuments to God were being built on the backs of the poor. The clergy were growing rich over such practices while the poor, reputedly the primary social focus of the Church, groaned under the weight of the combined taxes and endured as best they could but kept growing poorer. An explosion was brewing, an explosion of anger and fear over not only the practices of the Church but over the Church’s interpretation of the Bible. Martin Luther, who would ignite the explosion, was still in his early studies, he had yet to enter the University of Erfurt or join the Augustinian order, he was years away from his writing the 95 thesis that would touch off the Protestant Revolution or the Reformation. Other people had tried to touch off the revolution, to reform the church, but all had failed. The situation was ripe, it was ready for him and his action. It was just waiting for him to do it.
Thanks to the strategic location of Italy and the backwardness of the rest of Europe, it was a time when Italy dominated the artistic scene and was at the forefront of great strides in knowledge. The trade and communication Italy had with the Islamic world opened up Italian eyes to many things. The philosophies and the arts had been improving in Italy for centuries. The development of Italian art was building up to a level of glory that has never been matched before or since. Earlier artists had conducted studies in observation and depth perception, forever revolutionizing the artistic world and contributing immensely to our scientific knowledge. The great Renaissance painter and philosopher, Leonardo da Vinci was fifty one years old with most of his achievements behind him yet his contributions to art and knowledge still stun men of letters today. Michelangelo was at the height of his powers, the Sistine Chapel was just a few years in his future. Raphael was starting his career. Though the presence of the Papacy necessitated that almost all of the art was religious in nature, its glory was apparent and its contribution to what we now call the study of optics was immense. Yet the inquisitive spirit was spreading beyond Italy.
Key inventions were created during this time, but probably the most important invention of the second millenium. This invention, the printing press, had been invented by Johannes Gutenberg between 1448 and 1450, sparking a revolution in bookmaking and ensuring that ideas would be spread rapidly for a small fee. This allowed the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle to reawaken in Western Europe after a long dormant sleep and would aid in spreading knowledge, both of the past and what was being written. This inventive spirit would eventually encourage lenscrafters to put multiple lens together inside tubes, creating the microscope and the telescope. And it all started with Gutenberg.
Thanks to the invention of Johannes Gutenberg, it was not just a time of inventions, it was also a time of ideas. Greek thought, especially that of the recently rediscovered Aristotle, dominated, but already European thinkers were beginning to use Aristotle’s own processes to find conclusions that differed from those Aristotle had written. Doing exactly as Aristotle wanted done, but what had not been done during the days of the Roman Empire, thinkers were questioning the past and seeking answers, laying the foundation for the great discoveries that would come. And even his methods were being improved on, which he would have certainly approved of. One example, but the most noteworthy one of the time: Nicolaus Copernicus, who had just obtained his doctorate in cannon law and astronomy from the University of Padua, had just begun his investigation of the heavens. After he returned to the Bishopric of Warmia, where he would remain for the rest of his life, he would continue his researches and studies that would eventually result in the Copernican Revolution. The glories of the sciences and philosophies were still to come – the great Philosopher/Scientists Galileo, Kepler, Descartes, Newton and Leibniz were not even born, but the groundwork was being laid.
For a long while the Italians had a literal monopoly on all trade with the east. To break the Italian monopoly, other nations were striving to find alternate routes to the Indies. Due to the inspiration of the Portuguese prince Henry the Navigator, who had died just forty years prior to Nostradamus’ birth, the Portuguese had rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1490, allowing Vasco da Gama to drop anchor in India in 1498. In 1492, eleven years before Nostradamus’ birth, Columbus had sailed across the Atlantic to find the Indies or Cathay – he was the first European to ever see the Caribbean Isles and the continent that would eventually become known as South America. Amerigo Vespucci had realized it was a “New World” when he wrote to Queen Isabella in 1502.
Politically Europe was building up to an explosion, even if nobody believed it! Italy was still the dominant economic and political region, the Papacy was still officially in control of all of Europe, but thanks to papal disinterest in temporal affairs and the ambitions of certain kings the situation was now in flux. The Holy Roman Empire, nominally under the yoke of the house of Hapsburg and which was neither holy nor roman nor an empire was the seat of great division thanks to Papal interference during the reign of Heinrich IV. Italy, the seat of the supreme government of Western Europe, was divided into city states, a relic of the medieval period and the desire of the Papacy to dominate all through religious control. Poland was weak, Bohemia simply existed, Hungary was fending off attacks from the Ottoman Empire which controlled much of the Balkans and Scandinavia was transitioning from the remnants of Viking rule to a more peaceful civilization, though the lands were sparsely populated. Muscovy had just thrown off the Tartar Yoke, reinstating a region where Orthodoxy reigned. And there were still parts of Europe that were under the control of the Mongols. But the key was that the Atlantic kings were finally coming into their own power, their expansions, explorations and wars would shape Europe.
Portugal having already established a trade route with India had taken the lead; Manuel I of Portugal ruled what was then the richest kingdom with the most powerful navy in Western Europe. It had already taken a huge chunk of the eastern trade away from the Italians and, encouraged by lack of Papal interest in this affair, was seeking to take away more. It had completed its reconquest of its portion of the Iberian Peninsula and was steadfastly remaining independent of the other Iberian kingdoms: Castile and Aragon.
Portugal had been at peace for several hundred years, the reconquest had been completed around the 13th century. With natural barriers protecting it north and east a small army could defend it with relative ease. Naturally it began to develop a navy and a merchant focus. Its natural route was to the sea and Prince Henrique, known in Portugal as the Duque de Viseu but known elsewhere as Henry the Navigator, started Portugal on the long journey of exploration around Africa. When Bartolomew Dias rounded the tip of Africa and named the cape the Cape of Storms, João II de Portugal renamed it the Cape of Good Hope. He was right to do so as just three years before Nostradamus was born Vasco de Gama dropped anchor in Calcutta. The route to the Indies had been found.
Encouraged by the Papacy, Ferdinand of Aragon along with Isabella of Castile were pushing back the Muslims in Iberia, conquering the Kingdom of Cordoba which was the last remnant of Islam in the Iberian Peninsula, creating the Spanish nation and developing an empire in the Americas. Their daughter, Joanna, was married to the Hapsburg Philip, their grandson through this union, Charles, Carlos in Spanish, was destined to rule a vast empire.
The Medieval period of Spain was still ongoing, the reconquest was still in force. Having been conquered by the end of the dark ages (1000 CE), the people of the Iberian Peninsula had been fighting back, freeing their land from foreign conquest. As a result they had developed a very centralized and powerful military, conquest and dominion were primary among them. Castile was the dominant force, its armies under Isabella had forced the Islamic forces into a small southern enclave and her union with Ferdinand of Aragorn unified the royal house of Trastámara, Spain's only home grown royal house. The union also aided in the preparations for the final push to evict the Muslims from the Iberian Peninsula. Contrary to popular belief, Ferdinand was not much of an individual. The real dynamic was provided by Isabella. It was her influence that resulted in the marriage that unified the kingdom as well as the push to evict the Muslims from the Iberian Peninsula. And contrary to a legend that has roots in sexism, Isabella never threatened to sell her jewels to finance the trip for Columbus, she financed it using the finances of Castile. Though she was exactly what was needed to complete the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula and unify the Spanish nation, she also left a strong warlike tradition in the Spanish lands, a warlike tradition that would make the Spanish army the strongest in Europe but would also bleed the Spanish nation dry. And though Castile and Aragon were now unified, the Spanish dreamed of completing the Iberian reunification and incorporating Portugal into the Spanish kingdon; Isabella did nothing to counter this.
Though the Spanish and the Portuguese were exploring the world, their early attempts at colonization were almost guaranteed to cause the two nations to come into conflict with each other. Neither nation wanted that. To resolve the issue, they had approached their overlord, the Papacy. But they knew that the Papacy would not be interested unless it involved a spiritual side. An excuse was found, both nations were interested in spreading the Christian faith to the foreign lands and neither had wanted to interfere with the efforts of the other. If his Holiness would just be so kind as to review the dispute between his two vassals and make a decision that was fair and equitable both nations would give homage to his Holiness the Pope. The Papacy therefore had split the entire world between the two nations in 1494. A treaty would move the division a few hundred miles but by bowing to the Catholic Church, the Spanish and Portuguese were able to prevent a war between them and were able to continue the development of their far flung empires without opposition - at least for the time as the French and English were too busy with their own internal affairs.
The popular Louis XII ruled France. The only nation that was granted a special dispensation that made it independent of the Papacy, France was in a unique situation as long as it was careful. Under Louis, France was starting to feel its strength. Unfortunately the French endured military disasters in Italy against the hated Spanish, specifically the forces of Aragon.
France was just emerging from the medieval period which, for that nation, was a long struggle with England. France had, for the most part, emerged the victor and English ambitions were now locked into one French city that still remained under English control. However, it had been very close. The memory of the English attempt was still in most French minds. Nobody knows how a peasant maid was able to do what she did, taking a dispirited and defeated French army and uncrowned king and, after somehow raising the English siege on the city of Orleans, literally getting the army to march through enemy occupied territory to get the true heir crowned in the traditional coronation city, defeating army after army along the way. But she did and though the Maid of Orleans had died just 69 years prior to the birth of Nostradamus, all Frenchmen still felt deeply indebted to Jean de Arc’s seemingly miraculous intervention and were convinced that God had played a critical role in saving the nation from English control. And who knows, maybe He did. Because of the recent relief the nobility of France was very interested in a very strong French government. That said, because the fierce struggle had prevented the French from making the changes the English had, the political structure of France was still strongly feudal in nature with nobles and barons still having their own standing armies. And some, notably the House of Lorraine, had royal pretentions to the throne of France itself. Though the feudal structure was weakening, its existence would have terrible consequences during the upcoming Religious Wars and beyond.
In England, the War of the Roses had ended, the Plantagenet dynasty was destroyed. Henry Tudor, the founder of the dictatorship known as the Tudor Dynasty, was now King of England as Henry VII. Frugal and pragmatic with a reputation for avarice, Henry focused on rebuilding the finances of the nation. And in a very wise maneuver he had married a daughter of his enemies, Elizabeth of York, producing a settlement that all sides could live with and bring peace to that troubled land. Though the kings of England were officially acknowledged vassals of the Papacy thanks to King John, the pope ignored England as much as possible. Except, of course, when he needed money!
King and Parliament worked together to maintain the peace. Remembering the savagery of the recently ended War of the Roses, the Parliament went out of its way to work with Henry Tudor. who also went out of his way to work with the Parliament - as long as he got his way. And Henry, very wisely, did not do anything to upset it, though he pushed hard for decisions that strengthened the crown and maintained the peace. And for good reason for in the minds of everyone was the recently ended War of the Roses. The House of Plantagenet, along with its cadent branches of Lancaster and York had been destroyed with no male descendants to assume the throne. A great number of nobles had perished and multiple noble houses were extinct. Henry, a descendant of a female branch of Lancaster, was the first non-Plantagenet to assume the throne since Henry II. So both King and Parliament were very interested in maintaining the peace. A dictatorship it may have been but it was one that the nation willingly submitted to and one that Tudor was very careful to not abuse. As a result, the nation recovered and prospered.
Farther north Henry’s main enemy was the Scottish king James IV of Scots, who had supported turmoil in England during the War of the Roses but now felt that peace was the best thing between the two nations. James was a Renaissance King, if any non-Italian king could be called such, because he was a supporter of the sciences and the arts. Unfortunately for his kingdom and for the British isle, he also maintained his alliance with France, an alliance which would have future repercussions.
Of all the western nations, the Scottish were probably the most feudal in all ways, which meant that fundamentally they were the weakest of the nations, even though it would have a lot of say in the development of Europe, especially of England and France. Several of the clans, mainly the Bruce and the Douglas clans, were classic nobles in that they had pretentions to the crown itself. The lowlands was bad enough with the clan heads acting like barons, many of whom wanted the throne for themselves, but at least their structure was remarkably feudal in nature. The highlands it was worse - there the king was nothing more than a leader of clans who could be ignored at the pleasure of the clan chief. And in a classic medieval show of power the Kirk, the Church of Scotland, exerted enormous influence over the kings of Scotland. As a result, the Scottish king had often had a hard time just maintaining the Throne. Mary, Queen of Scots, would not be the only Scottish monarch who got enormous trouble thanks to both the Scottish nobility and the Kirk.
Scotland was really in a very weak fundamental position and there was nothing it could do to fix it. Other nations had their weaknesses true but they also had their strengths, even if the strengths were in part thanks to circumstances. The Spanish had their centralized armies that unified Spain plus a strong centralized government, the armies would weaken Spain true but they strengthened it past all other nations. The Portuguese had their merchant marine, their natural defenses and their focus to find the Indies, they had the best of the situations. The French had the glory of the monarchy and the beginnings of a centralized army, though it was still exceedingly feudal in nature it also had the memory of the Hundred Years War and the realization of the need for a strong monarchy. Even French nobles who had pretentions to the crown of France realized the overall importance of having a strong monarchy. The English had the Common Law, the Parliament, the sheriff system that enforced the laws and the archer soldiers, a unified army to defend it, it may have been the most fundamentally well based nation of all. The Scots had nothing to unify the nation – absolutely nothing. It had the Kirk and the nobility playing havoc with the nation without anything to unify it. So unity of purpose, focus and power was never a Scottish trait. And thanks to their constant reliance on the indomitable spearmen, they never advanced their military arts. All of this made for a very weak central government that would, at best, be a pawn to French ambitions.
And finally there was the land of Flanders, the Lowlands from which the Dutch and Belgic nations would emerge. At the time they were under Hapsburg control, tight enough that no strong nobles rose. As a result they never developed the strong sense of kingship or nobility like that which encouraged a royal lineage like the King of France, the Prince of Monacco or the Duchy of Savoy. Instead a number of lesser nobles developed, each of which played critical rolls in the development of the region. Trade and shipping was the primary focus of the land. This focus on trade with the lack of major nobles would inevitably result in the Dutch Republic.
During the lifetime of Nostradamus everything that was seething under the surface erupted! Luther broke with Rome, touching off the Protestant Revolution and beginning the destruction of Roman suzerainty; the divided German States embraced Lutheranism as a means of asserting their own power. After writing a document defending the Catholic Church, Henry VIII of England also broke from Rome, taking the English nation with him. When the inevitable excommunications failed to stop Luther and Henry it proved to an astonished Europe that Roman power was not as strong as during the time of Heinrich. Carlos (Charles) I of Spain then went so far as to invade Rome, daring the unimaginable step of making the Papacy pawns of Spanish interests and providing an example that centuries later Napoléon Bonaparte would follow. Though the French eventually did counter Carlos and restore the Papal States, Papal control of Europe was shattered. Copernicus published his revolutionary work, beginning the revolution in the philosophical sciences that tore apart the basis of absolute faith in the Bible for all knowledge. And finally, John Calvin was born, he would also break from Rome, start the Calvinist movement, bring war through much of Europe and complete the destruction of the single world church view that had dominated Europe for so long.
The world Nostradamus was born into was the end of the medieval world, a world dominated by the Catholic Church where even kings had to bow to Rome. Kings chaffed at the idea and many declared themselves to be the true rulers of their land, a declaration that by that time the Papacy did little to actively counter, but they acknowledged, however unwillingly, the overall authority of the Papacy. The example of Gregory humiliating Heinrich still haunted the kings and gave the church extraordinary power. And the power of the dread Inquisition was not to be laughed at. The church was not using their power, except where religious matters dominated, but they still had it.
The world Nostradamus left when he died was the beginning of the modern world. Religion still dominated, but Catholicism's power was severely checked, the Protestant churches were thriving, the kings and great dukes were for the most part true lords of their own lands and secular thought was beginning to emerge. The Catholic Church still controlled the hearts of half of western Christendom and the counterreformation was in full sway but never again would kings be vassals to the Pope or bow in submission to the Papacy. The legacy of Gregory and Heinrich was shattered.