Lost manuscript of Nostradamus . found

Master collateral

One day in 2007, librarians at the Library of the Barnabiti Historical Research Center in Rome (Italy) were puzzled when their Latin copy of Les Prophéties, a collection of prophecies of Nostradamus, flew without wings. Searching all over the library, they were disappointed that this precious work was still missing.

The prophet Nostradamus (1503-1566).

At the time, they did not think the controversial Nostradamus manuscript, published around the early 18th century (150 years after the French original was published in 1555), returned after 15 years of wandering.

One fine day, Italian authorities announced that they had found the lost manuscript in Germany, where it was put up for auction in 2021 by someone who had no idea it was a precious antiquity.

Accordingly, while monitoring the legitimate antiques auction market, where stolen antiquities sometimes appear, a representative of the Carabinieri (Italian Army's Cultural Heritage Preservation Force) came across it. image of the book on the auction house's website.

He recognized a stamp on the cover of the book certifying it as belonging to a library in Italy. Carabinieri conducted a thorough investigation shortly thereafter and determined it to be a copy of the legendary work of Nostradamus in the research library in Rome lost in 2007.

After being contacted by the Italian police, the German auction house immediately stopped this sale. It was discovered that the book had been purchased from a flea market in Paris. It is not clear how it went after that, but when it arrived in Germany, the book was sold at a flea market in the city of Karlsruhe.

An art dealer recognized the book's real value and arranged for it to be listed on the website of an auction house in Pforzheim, Baden-Württemberg, with a starting price of 12,000 euros. .

If the sale goes well, the book could sell for even more, given the reputation of Nostradamus. But instead of going into the hands of a private collector, the manuscript has now been returned to its rightful place at the Barnabiti Historical Research Center Library.

Who is Nostradamus?

Nostradamus is the Latinized name of Michel de Nostredame, born in 1503 in Provence, southeastern France. He was a successful doctor, but also known as an astrologer and psychic. He can accurately predict future world events.

It was not until 1555 that he published his book of prophecy, but his astrological abilities were widely known by this time. Nostradamus attracted many followers and wealthy patrons, including Catherine de Medici, queen of France.

Nostradamus' dual interest in medicine and the occult seems unusual from a modern point of view. But in his day, astrology and alchemy were considered legitimate practices, not superstition or pseudoscience.

During the Renaissance and Enlightenment, it was quite common for prominent scholars and thinkers to combine scientific discovery with occult experimentation. This is perhaps best reflected in the career of Isaac Newton, the discoverer of gravity. In fact, in the 17th and 18th centuries, Newton wrote more about alchemy than about mathematics and physics.

Confusing prophecies

The manuscript "Prophecy" is lost.

What made Nostradamus famous at the time was his claim to the ability to see the future and accurately predict what would happen in his time and beyond.

Although he had many supporters in the 16th century, even to this day, his claims are difficult to prove or disprove, just looking at "The Prophecies". The problem is that Nostradamus' predictions are said to be vague and confusing, leading to many different interpretations.

Each of his predictions is made in a rhyming, four-line poem called a quatrain. To complicate matters further, they are intentionally written in the coding language that needs to be decoded.

This may in part be due to Nostradamus' fear of the Inquisition accusing him of cult or witchcraft, if the writings are too easy to understand (this is the hypothesis accepted by many scholars).

Furthermore, Nostradamus never precisely timed his predictions, and his analogies and metaphors often conjured vivid images, but were always so vague that it was difficult to interpret.

However, if Nostradamus was indeed a clairvoyant, seeing future events with his own eyes, this could be extremely confusing for him, since he was looking into a world. much more advanced technology than the current world. His use of cryptic language seems to indicate confusion over what he is seeing, rather than coding to avoid arrest.

Many people studied his writings in detail, then wrote their own books and articles about him. They believe he correctly predicted the beginning of the French Revolution, the rise of Napoleon and Hitler, and even the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York City in September 2001.

Skeptics, of course, counter this, claiming that his writings are so vague that they can be interpreted in a thousand different ways.

The verses of Nostradamus have now been published in dozens of books and on hundreds of websites, in many languages. They have never been easier for the curious to discover for themselves Nostradamus and his enigmatic works.