Nationality United Kingdom Other names Erika McMahon-Turner | Name Erika Cheetham Role Writer | |
Born 7 July 1939 ( 1939-07-07 ) London, England Occupation Writer, linguist, medieval scholar Died May 3, 1998, London, United Kingdom Books The final prophecies of Nostradamus, Final Prophecies Nostradamus Spec, Final Prophecies Nostradamus Pbp | ||
Erika Cheetham (7 July 1939 – 3 May 1998) was an English writer, best known for her controversial interpretations of Nostradamus' writings.
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Early life
She was born Erica Christine Elizabeth McMahon-Turner in London. Her parents enrolled her in a convent school, from which she was expelled for positing the non-existence of God. Later while attending St Anne's College, Oxford, she married James Nicholas Milne Cheetham.
After earning her doctorate (in medieval language) at Oxford she worked as a staff writer for the Daily Mail, a London tabloid. She began translating Les Prophéties de M. Nostradamus in 1963, which culminated in the publication of her first book The Prophecies of Nostradamus: The Man Who Saw Tomorrow in 1965. This was the basis for the 1980 Orson Welles film of the same title.
"Angolmois"
Prophéties 10:72 is one of Nostradamus' most infamous quatrains:
Cheetham interpreted Angolmois as a cryptic anagram for "Mongols", predicting the rise (circa mid-1999) of an Antichrist—ostensibly the third such figure (after Napoleon and Hitler)—a tyrant ("king of terror") of Genghis Khan's calibre. However, other scholars have argued that this is merely a variant spelling of Angoumois, a province of western France now known as Charente, and that d'effrayeur was actually supposed to be deffraieur, i.e. one given to appeasement.
"Samarobryn"
The first word of the third line of Prophéties 6:5 has been variously interpreted as a reference to the USS. Sam Rayburn, a ballistic missile submarine, or even to individual SAMs, i.e. surface-to-air missiles:
However, Cheetham dissents again from other Nostradamian scholars—and from herself—by proposing that Nostradamus derived the word samarobryn either:
"Pau, Nay, Loron"
Cheetham cited quatrains 1:60 and 8:1 of Nostradamus' Prophéties as a cryptic reference to Napoleon Bonaparte.
Whilst the uppercase letters (preserved from Nostradamus' original) may suggest a deeper meaning, sceptics will note the mutual proximity of the Aquitainian villages Pau, Nay, and Oloron (in southwestern France), which form a small triangle not 70 kilometres (43 mi) about. Though more esoteric interpretations have pegged this region "more fire than blood" as a future nuclear waste site, Cheetham's observation was that the capitalised letters can be arranged to spell something like "NAYPAULORON", i.e. Napoleon. Singer-songwriter and hist-rock pioneer Al Stewart also favoured this interpretation in his 1974 song "Nostradamus", wherein he deliberately pronounces and spells Bonaparte's name in a similar idiosyncratic manner.
"Hister"
Prophéties 2:24:
Cheetham interpreted this as a reference to Adolf Hitler, the "child of Germany [who] obeys [no law]". This conclusion disregards Hitler's Austrian heritage and the Latin use of Hister (derived from the Milesian–Greek settlement of Histria in ancient Thrace, and in turn from the Scythian river-god Ίστρος/Istros) to refer to the Lower Danube. Nonetheless this too is preserved in Stewart's lyrics:
Israel
Prophéties 3:97:
This prophecy, according to Cheetham, predicts the establishment of the modern State of Israel.