On Monday 5 February 2024, Buckingham Palace announced that King Charles III had been diagnosed with cancer. “His Majesty has today commenced a schedule of regular treatments, during which time he has been advised by doctors to postpone public-facing duties…” said a statement. Apart from providing a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for everyone to find out, once and for all, whether or not there really does exist a cure for the disease, this development has also once again brought up a question that has been asked over and over again for the last almost 500 years: Is another Nostradamus prophecy about to be fulfilled?
Throughout history, soothsayers, prophets, seers, and mystics have fascinated us with purported abilities to glimpse into the future. Undoubtedly, the most famous of these is Michel de Nostredame. You will know him as Nostradamus.
In a chilling prediction made in 1555, Nostradamus apparently foresaw the “abdication” of King Charles III…and not in favour of anyone you’d expect!
This prophecy attracted sharp focus after the death of EIIR in 2022. The French astrologer and reported oracle has attracted international notoriety for allegedly foretelling future events: the French Revolution, 9/11, the Iraq war, the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and the rise of Hitler come to mind.
Born in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence in 1503, Nostradamus gained renown for his collection of cryptic quatrains, which many believe forecast significant historical events. Believers maintain that Nostradamus’s predictions are as accurate as they come, and cite instances where his verses foreshadowed events that marked great social and historical upheaval.
One of the prophecies currently setting tongues a-wagging revolves around the British royal family and specifically implicates Prince Harry. According to adherents, Nostradamus foresaw a time when the traditional line of succession in the House of Windsor would be disrupted, leading to Prince Harry’s unexpected ascension to the throne. This becomes even more intriguing when one considers that the Duke of Sussex is fifth in the line of succession, and famously renounced his HRH and military titles. He further stepped down as a senior royal, effectively quitting the Royal family altogether.
Nostradamus claimed that Charles would be forced out by the British public, leading to an unexpected man being named the new reigning monarch: “Because they disapproved of his divorce / A man who later they considered unworthy / The people will force out the King of the Islands / A man will replace him who never expected to be king.”
Mario Reading, an expert on Nostradamus, analysed this subject in depth in his 1982 book Nostradamus: The Complete Prophecies For The Future, where he outlined that Nostradamus successfully predicted that Queen Elizabeth would die in 2022. He further claimed that her death would lead Australia to break away from the Commonwealth. “This quatrain will come as no surprise to the British people and it has wide implications,” Reading, who died in 2017, wrote.
“The preamble is that Queen Elizabeth II will die, circa 2022, at the age of around ninety-six, five years short of her mother’s term of life. Prince Charles will be crowned in her stead and become ‘King of the Islands’, the implication here being that he is no longer king of the other regions in the world over which his mother reigned – Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc. – which will have, in the interim, become republics.”
He then sensationally claimed Nostradamus believed the public’s anger towards Charles, following the 1997 death of Diana, Princess of Wales, would force his abdication. “Prince Charles will be seventy-four years old in 2022 when he takes over the throne, but the resentments held against him by a certain proportion of the British population, following his divorce from Diana, Princess of Wales, still persist,” Reading continued. But his interpretation didn’t end there. In a 2006 version of the book, Reading discussed who would replace Charles as king: “The pressure on him is so great, and his age so much against him, that Charles agrees to abdicate in favour of his elder son, Prince William.” And then the train completely veers off the track.
In one quatrain, Nostradamus predicts: “The young lion will overcome the older one / On the field of combat in single battle / He will pierce his eyes through a golden cage / Two wounds made one, then he dies a cruel death.”
While this quatrain’s imagery may seem cryptic at first, some argue that it foretells a power struggle within the royal family, with Prince Harry emerging victorious in the end. The reference to a “golden cage” is interpreted as a metaphor for the constraints of royal tradition, suggesting that Prince Harry will break free from these shackles to claim his rightful place as king.
Sceptics, however, caution against reading too much into Nostradamus’s verses, pointing out that they are often vague and open to wide-ranging interpretations. This vagueness lends itself to what is called confirmation bias. In desperate times, soothsayers have a ready audience. It is the meeting point of cynicism and gullibility.
Applying these prophecies to specific individuals and events is akin to searching for patterns in random noise, a practice known as pareidolia. The quatrain quoted above is the perfect example.
Nostradamus became a close friend of Catherine de Médici, the queen of France, the death of whose husband, Henry II, he is supposed to have predicted in this same verse, which has been taken to refer to a jousting tournament in 1559 when Gabriel, Comte de Montgomery’s importunate lance burst through the king’s poorly secured visor and skewed his eye, throat and temple, resulting in his death 11 days later. But the prophecy’s veracity is in doubt because it didn’t appear in print until long after that fatal encounter.
Despite the controversy surrounding Nostradamus’s prophecies, they continue to capture the public imagination, fuelling speculation and debate about the future. Whether Prince Harry will indeed fulfil the prophecy of becoming king remains to be seen. In the meantime, the prophecy of his ascension to the throne of Britain as foretold by Nostradamus remains a subject of fascination and much debate. While some view it as a compelling glimpse into the future, others dismiss it as mere conjecture.
Regardless, the enduring appeal of prophecy lies in its ability to spark curiosity and imagination, inviting us to ponder the mysteries of fate and destiny. Whether Prince Harry will one day wear the crown remains uncertain, but the legend of Nostradamus and his cryptic quatrains will undeniably endure as a testament to our eternal quest for insight into what lies ahead.
That said, at least Nostradamus did predict his own death in 1566. Mind you, given that the prediction was made a day before he died, and that he was almost bedridden with arthritis, dropsy, and arteriosclerosis, perhaps this was not so much an indication of his prophetic genius as a statement of the obvious
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