Someone emailed me with this. I think it’s a hoax but have never researched Nostradamus enough to know if he’s a fraud or too general.
Did he really say this? Sorry I don’t have a cite because he wouldn’t give it to me but I’m sure this will spread.
I have heard that quote more than once today. But remember that Nostradamus’s works were originally written in French and contain many metaphors, not to mention the great library of unfulfilled prophecies and among them a rare few which can be argued to have come true, inevitable when so many prophecies are made. Just an example: the end of the world in July 2000. I don’t remember that.
Who is the great leader? Bush? Ha.
New York is no City of God.
In general, most Nostradamus quotes are about as accurate as the readings in the bowl of Alpha-bits you had this morning.
This site contains a searchable database of supposedly all the writings.
I did a search of “brothers”, “leader” “fortress” and “succumb” and found nothing like the OP quote.
I did find
“When the snakes surround the altar,
The Trojan blood is troubled by the Spains:
Because of them a great number will be lessened,
The leader flees, hidden in the swampy marshes”
Bush DID go to Louisiana first didn’t he?
Just an example of how this works. You find what you’re looking for after the fact when you can twist it to what you want.
Nostradamus speaks but hear also Jellydonut’s first post.
I’m so annoyed with this kind of garbage. If I ever get around to finishing that time machine of mine, I’m going to go back in time and throw Nostradamus into a pit of flaming tar.
First of all, no he never said it. Nostradamus spoke French. Most of his quatrains have been poorly translated. The only place in which the first part of this phrase is used is in a critical analysis of his supposed “prophecies” which you can read here. The second part of that phrase is too vague to even comment on. Third war? Big city? sheesh. Also, where’s the cite of the specific century and quatrain?
Believers in the nonsensical ravings of a post-medeival witch doctor are nitwits, utter nitwits. They are Nostradumbasses every one.
I know this ain’t the pit, but eff you JELLY. The stupidity of Nostradamus, and any nitwit who might believe his garbage, can be sneezed off quite easily without taking a jab at a great city like New York (what swamp you from?), particularly in light of the great tragedy we’re going through at this point. Think whatever you want, but there were people who had to be turned away from donating blood, the lines being so long. Not to say that you and your backwoods swamp-mates wouldn’t donate blood if the need arose. But don’t pee on my city, s*#t-head. So, again, eff you DONUT.
yeah i just read that same thing in a diffrent board
On top of being extremely vauge with his predictions, I remember seeing on a discover special that said he also wrote his prophecies in three diffrent languages. I can’t remember which, I think one of them was latin but I’m not sure.
Mummy, I’m scared the world will end last year.
There’s more to read here.
Snopes has the answer.
It is surely only a matter of time before someone comes up with an ‘explanation’ as to why the date ‘The year 1999 seven months’ in the famous ‘great King of Terror’ quatrain really meant September 2001. Such nonsense is the only thing about Nostradamus which is predictable.
They already have. Well, at least some at the gamefaqs.com message boards have. Some even go so far as to claim that in Nostradamus’ time, “The year 1999 seven months” would be referring to what we call September, 2001. Uh, sure…
Also, I find it amusing when that stuff gets overanalyzed. Even if he said all that stuff, it’s just a bit vague, and could refer to anything, really.
Just for the avoidance of any doubt, let me tell everybody that I fully agree with the sentiments expressed on this thread.
I entered “nostradamus”, “two brothers” and “city of god” into google and only came up with one page that had the “quote”:
The page is Nostradamus: A Critical Analisys and it is clear from the context that Nostradamus did not write the “quatrain”. The author of the web page obviously made it up as an example of how Nostradamus’s “predictions” could be made to fit an occurrance… given enough time. (Remember the “monkeys with typwriters reproducing Shakespeare” hypothesis?):
Nostradamus didn’t say it.
Oops. I just looked at Snopes. They reference the same page I found yesterday.
I love that line! 
I remember after OJ sliced up Ron and Nichole that there was a Nostradomus prediction about that too, and that was a hoax.
Jelly was refering to the fact that the usual translation of the ‘prophecy’ refers to the ‘city of God’. Normally Nostrodamus nuts translate this to mean Jerusalem or Mecca or some other religious centre. New York hardly qualifies.
So the interpretation in this case is even more a load of BS than usual.