The Prophecies
Page 8
1.21
Nourishing the rock the deep white clay
From a cleft below takes its milky birth :
No one dares touch it, needlessly afraid,
Unaware clay soil lies beneath the earth.
1.22
That which shall survive lacking any sense
Shall give its progenitor no respite :
At Autun, Chalon, Langres, & the two Sens,
Untold harm shall be caused by hail & ice.
1.23
In the third month with the Sun on the rise,
Boar & leopard meet on the battlefield :
Weary leopard lifts his eye to the sky,
Around the Sun he sees an eagle reel.
1.24
In New City, the brooder is reproved
By bird of prey appearing in the sky :
After victory, the captives pardoned,
At Cremo. & Mant. great hardships in sight.
1.25
Lost, found, in hiding for so long a while,
Shepherd as demigod shall be honored :
Before the Moon completes its full cycle,
By other vows shall he be dishonored.
1.26
During daytime a great clap of lightning,
Ill omen from the bearer of tidings :
The following portent falling at night :
Conflict in Reims, London, Tuscan blight.
1.27
Beneath the Guyenne oak struck by lightning,
Not far from there the hidden treasure lies
Which was seized countless centuries ago :
Who finds it dies, lockspring blinding his eye.
1.28
Off Tower of Bouc Barbary galley’s sails,
Long long after the armada of Spain :
The two destroying cattle, people, chattel,
From Taurus to Libra what deadly raids !
1.29
When the fish terrestrial & aquatic
By a mighty wave is tossed on the beach,
Its form weird, tallowy & horrific,
The enemy shall reach the walls by sea.
1.30
The storms at sea shall force the foreign ship
To make for land near an uncharted bay :
Despite the warning signs by palm fronds waved,
Death, then pillage : good advice, coming late.
1.31
For many years the wars grind on in Gaul,
Well after the reign of the king of Spain :
Uncertain victory shall three lords crown,
Eagle, Cock, Moon, Lion, Sun be marked again.
1.32
The empire shall soon find itself retired
Into a small place which shall fast expand :
A tiny space within a narrow shire
In midst of which his scepter he shall plant.
1.33
Near a great bridge amid the rolling plain,
The great lion with his Caesarean might
Shall start bombarding the defiant town :
Gates flung open to him in utter fright.
1.34
The bird of prey flying toward the left
Appears to the French before the battle :
A good omen to one, ill to the next,
Weaker party hoping it augurs well.
1.35
The young lion shall overcome the old
On the field of battle in single duel :
He’ll put out his eyes in his cage of gold,
Winner taking all, then a death most cruel.
1.36
The monarch shall later come to repent
Not having put his adversary to death :
But shall have to bow to something higher,
Which shall spill his blood until he expires.
1.37
Just before the sun goes into hiding,
A great nation caught up in dubious war :
Port affords defeated no asylum :
Bridge & sepulcher on two foreign shores.
1.38
Sun & eagle to the victor shall appear,
Vain assurance given to the vanquished :
Hue & cry shall not cause the troops to veer
From vengeance, peace alone assured by death.
1.39
By night the emperor, having outlived his use,
Shall be strangled in bed : the fair elect,
The empire being claimed by three & ruined,
Does the deed : note in packet left unread.
1.40
The deceitful trump that feigneth folly
Shall cause Byzantium to change its creed :
From Egypt comes one eager to be freed,
A change in coins & alloys he’ll decree.
1.41
The town besieged by night they shall attack,
Few escape the skirmishes by the shore :
Mother shall faint with joy that son is back :
Poison & sealed note tucked in envelope.
1.42
Tenth Calends of April, the Gnostic rite
By wicked persons shall now be revived :
Lights out, the assembled devils shall writhe
In the filth Origen, Psellus describe.
1.43
Before the transfer of empire occurs,
A marvel most great shall cause quite a shock :
The field shall shake, the porphyry pillar
Change place, translated to the knobby rock.
1.44
Sacrifices shall soon return in force :
Those who object shall be placed on the rack :
Monks, abbots, novices shall be no more :
Honey shall be more expensive than wax.
1.45
The bane of sects shall reward every spy :
The beast is brought onstage, the scene now set :
Deviser of this ancient rite made knight :
The world a mess, schism’d because of sects.
1.46
Not far from Auch, Mirande, & Lectoure
Lightning shall strike for a full three nights :
A most stupendous marvel shall occur,
And in its wake all the earth shall quake.
1.47
Lake Leman’s sermons shall prove tiresome :
Days shall be as long as weeks, weeks as months,
Months as years, before they all come undone :
Magistrates shall damn their mumbo jumbo.
1.48
Now that the Moon for twenty years has reigned,
Seven thousand more shall it last as king :
When the Sun resumes its remaining days,
My prophecy’s fulfillment it shall bring.
1.49
Long before the above things come to pass,
Those from the East by virtue of the moon
In seventeen hundred shall launch attacks,
Bringing much of the North under their rule.
1.50
From water’s triplicity shall be born
One who shall make Thursday his day of feast :
His fame, praise, reign, & power shall increase,
By land & sea he shall war his way east.
1.51
Saturn & Jove at the head of Aries,
Eternal God, all the mutations !
Then the slow round brings back bad times again :
Gaul & Italy, what perturbations !
1.52
In Scorpio the two wicked ones conjoined,
The grand seigneur is murdered in his room :
A plague on the church : the new king shall join
Lower Europe to the Septentrion.
1.53
Alas one shall see a great nation bleed
And the holy law & all of Christendom
Reduced to utter ruin by other creeds,
Each time a new gold, silver mine is found.
1.54
Ten revolutions of dread Saturn’s scythe
Shall effect changes
in ages & reigns :
It assumes its place in the mobile sign
Where the two are equal, their angles same.
1.55
Over against where Babel used to stand
Blood shall be spilled in such great effusion
As to defile sky & air, sea & land :
Sects, famine, kingdoms, plagues, confusion.
1.56
Sooner or later you shall see great change,
Extreme horrors & retaliations :
That if the moon be led by its angel,
The sky shall know no more trepidation.
1.57
Great Discord shall cause the trumpet to sound,
Accord broken, her head raised to the sky :
Her bleeding mouth shall be aswim in blood,
Face to the ground, smeared with milk & honey.
1.58
The belly slit, it’ll be born with two heads
And four arms & live a full year at least :
The day Aquileia celebrates its feasts,
Fossan, Turin shall lead Ferrara’s chief.
1.59
All the exiles deported to the isles
When a crueler king his power has won
Shall be put to death & two set on fire,
Who had been unable to curb their tongues.
1.60
Near Italy an Emperor shall be born
Who shall cost the Empire a pretty pence :
They shall ask to what people he is sworn,
Finding him more a butcher than a prince.
1.61
The republic miserable, without hap,
Shall be devastated by a new judge :
Then the wicked pack of exiles comes back,
Forcing the Swabians to break their pledge.
1.62
What great loss alas shall letters suffer
Before the Moon completes her cycle fair :
Fire, massive flooding, plus clueless rulers,
Which it shall take centuries to repair.
1.63
The scourges passed, the world a smaller place :
In inhabited lands a lasting peace :
Safe passage by air, earth, river & sea :
Then the wars starting up again apace.
1.64
At night they shall believe the sun does shine
When at the half-human pig they get a peek :
Noise, song, battalions battling in the sky
Shall be perceived & brute beasts heard to speak.
1.65
A child sans hands, lightning as never fell :
The royal child hurt in a tennis game :
Gone to grind grain at the lightning-scarred well,
Three shall be wrapped around the waist in chains.
1.66
He who shall then arrive with news to tell
Shall catch his breath again after a time :
At Viviers, Tournon, Monferrand, Pradelles,
Hail & storms shall make them heave quite a sigh.
1.67
The great famine that I sense approaching,
Turning this way & that, ever widespread,
So great, so long they shall end up plucking
Roots from the woods & babes from the breast.
1.68
To what horrible torments subjected,
Three innocents seized & delivered up :
Treachery, lax guarding, poison suspected,
Terrorized by hangmen in their cups.
1.69
The great mountain, seven stades in the round,
After peace, war, famine, inundation,
Shall roll afar, plunge lands into the ground,
With their ancient ruins & vast foundations.
1.70
Rain, famine, war in Persia dragging on,
The king betrayed by those he trusted best :
What there shall end was first begun in Gaul :
Secret warning against undue largesse.
1.71
The sea fort thrice taken & retaken
By Spain, Liguria & Barbary :
At Marseille, Aix, Arles, Pisan vastation :
Fire, sword, Avignon sacked by Turinese.
1.72
Marseille’s population utterly changed,
Flight & pursuit all the way to Lyon :
Narbonne & Toulouse by Bordeaux outraged :
Captives shall be killed, nearly a million.
1.73
Heedless France on five sides shall be assailed,
Tunis, Algiers stirred up by the Persians :
Sicily’s Leon., Barcelona failed,
Shall have no help by sea from Venetians.
1.74
After a rest, they’ll set sail for Epire,
Near Antioch they’ll get a great assist :
Blackcurl shall take the side of the Empire,
Bronzebeard proceed to roast him on a spit.
1.75
Siena’s tyrant shall strike Savona :
Its fort seized, he shall lay hold of its fleet :
The two hosts cross the Marches of Ancona :
Fearing for his life, the chief drags his feet.
1.76
He shall be called by the fiercest of names,
That of Fate, as the Three Sisters are known :
Then by word & deed he’ll lead a great race,
Surpassing all men in fame & renown.
1.77
Twixt two seas shall the promontory rise
Of him who later by a horse bite dies :
His own Neptune shall then furl his black sail,
Coasting by Gibraltar near Rocheval.
1.78
From an aged chief is born a half-wit son,
Degenerate in knowledge & in arms :
France’s chief by his sister shall be shunned :
Fields divided, conceded to gendarmes.
1.79
Bazas, Condom, Auch, Agen & Lectoure,
Stirred up by sects & the intrigues of fools,
Shall put to ruin Car., Bord., Bay. & Toulouse,
Wanting to revive their sacrifice of bulls.
1.80
From the sixth celestial splendor so bright
Great thunderclaps shall visit Burgundy :
A hideous beast shall spawn a monstrous sight :
March, April, May, June, blown to smithereens.
1.81
From human flock nine shall be set apart,
All due process & counsel be denied :
Their fate shall be decided from the start :
Kappa, Theta, Lambda : dead, scattered wide.
1.82
When wooden columns with red clay adorned
Tremble in the gusts of the southern wind,
The great assembly shall spill out of doors :
Vienna & all Austria shall cringe.
1.83
The foreigners shall divvy up the spoils
When Saturn against Mars angrily glows :
Tuscans & Latins slaughtered on their soil,
The Greeks eager to weigh in with their blows.
1.84
The moon obscured within the shadows’ maze,
Its brother wan, as dull as iron rust :
The lord, having long lurked in his hiding place,
Shall warm his blade within the bloody wound.
1.85
The king troubled by the lady’s answer,
The ambassadors shall fear for their lives :
The lord shall fake the hand of both brothers :
Anger, hatred, envy : the two shall die.
1.86
When the mighty queen sees herself subdued,
She shall display more courage than a man :
On horseback she shall cross the river nude :
Armed pursuit : she shall have broken the pact.
1.87
Ennosigaeus, the fire at earth’s core,
Shall set the New City all aquake :
&nb
sp; Two lords shall go on fighting futile wars :
New stream makes Arethusa blush with shame.
1.88
The prince shall be seized by epilepsy :
His wife, shortly before, he shall have wed :
His reputation shall plummet suddenly,
The counsel be killed by the shaven head.
1.89
Lerida folk shall advance to the Moselle,
Killing everyone from the Loire & Seine :
Help from the sea shall come near Hauteville,
When the Spaniard has opened every vein.
1.90
At the toll of the bell, Bordeaux, Poitiers
Shall march off as an army toward Langon :
Their northern wind shall gust against the Gauls,
When a hideous monster is born near Orgon.
1.91
The gods shall make it clear to mortal eye
That they are the authors of this great war :
Sword & lance shall be seen in the clear sky,
Then toward the left hand disasters galore.
1.92
Under one, universal peace decreed,
But not for long : plunder & rebellion :
Defiant city stormed by land & sea :
Dead or captured, a third of a million.
1.93
Near the mountains Italic earth shall quake :
The Lion & the Cock, though loosely leagued,
Shall help each other out under the shock :
Castille & Celts content to wait & see.
1.94
The tyrant has been slain at port Selin,
Yet liberty is not thereby restored :
The new Mars seeks war, seething with revenge :
The Lady honored out of fear & force.
1.95
Before a cloister a monk stumbles on
A twin of heroic & ancient race :
His local renown, the power of his tongue
Speak greatly for this sole-surviving twain.
1.96
The one who shall be invited to wipe