Did Nostradamus Predict the End of the World

QUESTION: Did Nostradamus predict the end of the world?

ANSWER:

Many people are asking, "Did Nostradamus predict the end of the world?" The very short answer to this question is no. Michel de Nostredame, later to become known as Nostradamus, was born in France in 1503 and died in 1566. He was a very well-educated man, an astrologer, an author, and a doctor, who specialized in the treatment of the Bubonic Plague. He became known as one of the leading experts in the treatment of the Plague. In spite of his expertise, his wife and two children succumbed to the illness and subsequently died from it.

His 'so called' prophesies and predictions have been extracted from the approximately 1000 letters he wrote in 4-line (quatrains) and 6-line (sixains) verses. In one of the letters, he clearly states (in plain French) that his predictions will go on for thousands of years, out to the year 3797. This is not a prediction for the end of the world, rather a statement about how far his projections would extend.

His astrological bent had a great deal to do with the content of his writings. Astrological authorities believed that history inevitably repeats itself. In one of his pieces, he wrote: "But the certainty of things past and present gives us confidence in things to come." Nostradamus had only to look back at the ancient chronicles, in particular those regarding 'omens' to find an abundance of material for his quatrains, and sixains. This he did to great effect.

The largest part of early seminal prophetic texts was written in Latin and included numerous scholarly abbreviations. They were printed in an unfathomable gothic script. This is critical because it meant that only the 'educated' could read them, let alone hope to understand those texts. It is known that Nostradamus had the access, and the ability to understand these classical works. He plagiarized from these, in some cases practically verbatim, to fill his letters. Some of the works are listed below:

Virgil's Eclogues (42-37 BC), Georgics (37-30 BC) and Aeneid (19 BC)
Julius Caesar's Gallic War (1st century BC)
Pliny the Elder's histories (1st Century BC)
Strabo's Historical Memoirs (1st century BC to 1st century AD)
Livy's History of Rome (1st century BC to 1st Century AD)
Petronius's Satyricon (1st century AD)
Suetonius's The Twelve Caesars (AD 120)
Plutarch's Parallel Lives (1st-2nd centuries AD)
Lucian's True History (2nd century AD)
Eusebius's Ecclesiastical History (4th century AD) and especially Julius Obsequens's On Omens (4th century AD)
Villehardouin's La Conquête de Constantinople (1209-13)
Joinville's Histoire de Saint-Louis (1270-1309), first printed in 1547
Froissart's celebrated Chroniques (1358 onwards, first printed 1504)
Commynes' Memoires (1489-98)
D'Auton's Chroniques de Louis XII (1499-1508)
The Rozier historial de France (1522)