Nostradamus had a Day Job
When Nostradamus wasn't making opaque predictions he was a plague doctor.
He lost his entire family (wife and kids) to the plague. He remarried and had a new family. Lost all of them to the plague. Married again... you see where this is going.
At the time Nostradamus must have seemed like the unluckiest man since Job.
From today's perspective, Nostradamus was obviously immune to the plague.
Did I mention that doctors didn't wash their hands until the late 1800s?
I picture this guy coming home from work everyday dripping plague... products, and greeting hapless family after family.
And this raises a big puzzle... why did people reject the idea of contagion from dirty hands, shared utensils, etc.. so doggedly and for so long?
Why was Cholera spread by infected wells considered a loony idea into the 1800s, and everyone 'knew' Cholera was a gas? (Many jews were killed during the plague years the 1300s on false accusations of poisoning wells, so the idea of getting a disease from well water wasn't unthought of, right?)
Why were these things so doggedly attributed to bad air? Aether's, vapors, effuluviums...
I have a theory, related to the kind of Aristotelian thinking that learned people did. The cause of disease is invisible. What else in the world is invisible? Gases, and only gases.
Only in the air was there no expectation of seeing the cause.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Poisoned well water....not anything naturally occurring.
And this raises a big puzzle... why did people reject the idea of contagion from dirty hands, shared utensils, etc.. so doggedly and for so long?
Because sickness and death were god's doing, or the devils. When you have the answer, why would you look for another? 
Ever wonder why the great seer couldn't see the deaths of his own family? Or how to prevent them?
