Joan of Arc Read online

  Bedford held the conviction, prevalent among the English, that Joan was a witch. In claiming to identify a witch he showed himself to be a thoroughly modern man. Witchcraft was a recent craze. For centuries intellectuals trained in Arab science had valued the occult knowledge transmitted through alchemy – by which a ‘projector’ could change ‘base’ or common metals into gold – and astrology, by which future events could be predicted from the movements of the heavens. These studies, which would lead to the evolution of modern chemistry and astronomy, were forms of magic attractive to the learned. There were other, less salubrious forms. Necromancers conjured up spirits within their magic circles, healers effected cures with magic potions and spells, sorcerers used holy objects for malicious purposes. All these had one thing in common: they dabbled with supernatural powers. No one, however, was as evil as those practising black magic or witchcraft, for the essence of witchcraft, the theologians said, was a pact with the devil. One revivalist preacher, Bernardino of Siena, told his listeners that anyone who failed to denounce a culprit to an inquisitor must answer for the omission on the Day of Judgement.

  In the English royal family, Bedford shared his elder brother’s horror of anything connected with witchcraft. The pressure of investigations, whether carried out by inquisitorial methods or not, required a clutch of erudite theologians and canon or Church lawyers. Since the early years of the thirteenth century the life of the Church had been transformed by the founding and dissemination of the orders of friars. It was above all the manpower of the first two orders, those founded by St Francis and St Dominic, and of these above all the Dominicans or Friars Preacher, who provided the Church with the men it needed. The long hours of study to which Dominicans were committed, made easier by opportunities afforded by the universities, prepared them for the arduous work of assessing who was or was not a heretic or a witch. They compiled books on procedure, kept records of their cases and outlined the symptoms they were looking for. Often, as in Joan’s case, they were dealing with illiterate suspects. Usually, as in her case too, they had a clear idea of what they were trying to find out; they wasted no time on confusion or contradiction. Once brought before an inquisitorial court, Joan might not have a technically correct trial – in her case prima facie she did not – but she would have her presuppositions clearly defined, she would have her words redrafted in technical, precise theological terms, she would have subtle arguments debated before her. What is astonishing about the surviving records is that in whatever circumstances they were compiled, they capture the tone of her spoken French, urgent, colloquial, direct. No one else talked so freely to Church lawyers and theologians, men of acumen and authority. Joan did not go quietly into the night.

  The Burgundians removed Joan from the war; the English kept her out of the war for good.

  One of her first enemies to interview her, according to an early chronicler, was Philip of Burgundy. He perceived her capture as a sign of God’s favour, in particular His wish that the affairs of the true King of England and France should prosper. Like many involved in French politics in the early fifteenth century, including Henry V and probably Joan herself, Philip viewed victory as a sign of God’s favour and defeat of His disapproval. Although from 1215 the Church no longer sanctioned priestly blessing of trials by battle, the attitude that God was on the side of the winners persisted and was to persist at least till the time of Oliver Cromwell. Joan was now a loser, and any lingering aura of invincibility was gone. She was a liability to those who had believed in her, for she was incapable of leading any more men to victory; and her prediction that the English would be driven first from Paris, then from France appeared incredible. She was a fantasist; there had been fantasists before.

  And yet her enemies began to take her more seriously, treating her less as a fantasist than as someone who was wickedly deluded. Philip was keen to send letters to cities in his lands, among them Leiden, Delft, Dordrecht, Zevenbergen and Amsterdam, telling them that she had been captured. His fame needed boosting. His men had taken Joan outside Compiègne: they could not take Compiègne itself. In August French troops began an attack on the southern Burgundian county of Charolais, which eventually fell in the spring of 1431. They also attacked the northern frontiers of the duchy near Auxerre, which had fallen to Joan, and defeated a Burgundian army at the battle of Chappes, near Bar-le-Seine. And although during the year the French assault came to a halt, Charles VII was able to keep up the pressure by enlisting the help of the Duke of Austria. Charles, it seems, was coming to share the opinion of the war party, who had agreed with Joan that Philip’s endless truces were not worth much. But for some time Charles still kept Georges de La Trémoïlle as his main adviser and was still persuaded that Trémoïlle’s belief in accommodation with Philip of Burgundy was a sound instinct. While the king’s son and heir, Louis XI, set out to destroy Burgundian power, Charles needed to neutralise that power to defeat England. In 1430–1 he could not do so, because Philip was content to remain an ally of the English.

  In November 1430 Joan was sold by Jean de Luxembourg, Comte de Ligny, vassal of the Duke of Burgundy, to the highest bidder, who just happened to be the English. It may seem strange that it took the best part of six months to decide who would be her gaoler. On 26 May 1430, a letter from the Vicar General of the Inquisitor was sent to Philip, asking that Joan be sent to the city of Paris for trial, on the grounds that she was suspected of having committed crimes ‘smacking of heresy’, and promising to act in accordance with the advice and favour of the good men of the university. This letter was followed up by two more letters from the university itself, one for Philip and another for Jean de Luxembourg; that to Jean expressed concern that there had been talk of Joan being ransomed, as indeed there had been. The two men were invited to hand her over for trial to the Bishop of Beauvais, ‘within whose diocese she has been apprehended’. Both the university and the bishop were to get what they wanted, but not in the manner that they wanted. The letters, dated 14 July, were brought to the Burgundian camp by Pierre Cauchon, who demanded that he handle Joan himself. Cauchon was determined to cope with a heretic who had defied his English masters and who was indirectly responsible for his being driven fom his see. He had an inducement for those whom he met: he could offer good English money, either a pension of 2,000–3,000 livres for Guillaume de Wandonne, the man-at-arms who had taken Joan prisoner, and 6,000 livres for his lord or, in Henry’s name, 10,000 francs ‘according to the right, usage and custom of France’. The terms made clear one fact that was bound to have a bearing on the trial: Joan was to be not a prisoner of the Church, but a prisoner of the English.

  Jean de Luxembourg hesitated. He was in no hurry to give Joan up. He wanted cash and Bedford was short of cash. Bedford persuade the Estates of Normandy to grant an aide of 120,000 livres tournois, of which 10,000 was to ‘purchase . . . Joan the Maid, who is said to be a sorcerer, a warlike person, leading the armies of the Dauphin’; the cash, most of it in gold, had to be advanced by the English exchequer. Cauchon reported back to the Earl of Warwick that his negotiations were going well. Joan stayed with Jean, first at Clairoix near Compiègne, then at Beaulieu-les-Fontaines, near Noyon. At first her steward, Jean d’Aulon, attended her, but when she tried to escape from Beaulieu Castle, she was put alone into a tiny, dark cell. Eventually she was transferred to Jean de Luxembourg’s principal château at Beaurevoir, and it was there that she gained powerful friends in Jean’s wife, his wealthy aunt Jeanne and possibly his stepdaughter too. They tried to persuade her to wear women’s clothes; and the discussions that Joan had with the ladies has given the impression that this was a pleasant period for her. But while for Jean and the Earl of Warwick she was a counter worth bargaining for, to some of the French her value had vanished. Archbishop Regnault of Reims told his people peevishly that she ‘had not wanted to take advice, but to do everything according to her wishes’, and as for Charles, it may have been as a gesture of his admiration of her when in 1437 he entered Paris tha
t he asked the devoted d’Aulon to walk beside him holding the bridle of his horse. In 1430 he may have thought of trying to help her, but he did nothing. There was in fact little he could do.

  Joan jumped from the Beaurevoir tower, either as a bid for freedom or as a gesture of despair. Jean took no chances: he wanted his money. She was therefore sent under close guard to be imprisoned in the duke’s city residence, the Cour Le Comte at Arras. On 21 November the University of Paris wrote to congratulate King Henry that she was in his power and to ask that she be transferred into the custody of Cauchon and the Inquisitor. The request was premature – she was then only at Le Crotoy – and naive – the English had no intention of handing her over to anyone. Five weeks later she was already in Rouen. On 28 December Cauchon arranged to be conceded a territorial jurisdiction so that she could be tried as though in Beauvais; and on 3 January she was technically handed over to him by the English, technically because she remained an English prisoner. As a lawyer who had tried heretics once before (in 1426), Cauchon wanted to make the trial appear to be fair. Equally, the English lay authorities wanted only one result: her death.

  SIX

  The Preparatory Trial

  The first stage of any inquisitorial process could involve a lengthy inquiry, during which the judges attempted to find out the precise grounds on which the accused could be indicted for heresy. In Joan’s case this led to cross-questioning, as the judges often seemed to go round in circles, like some bird of prey seeking the best way to attack its victim. By comparison, the subsequent ‘ordinary’ or actual trial was short and to the point.

  The record of the trial is couched in the sonorous phrases beloved of grand ecclesiastics. ‘Pierre, by divine mercy Bishop of Beauvais, and brother Jean Lemaître, of the order of Preaching friars . . . and venerable master Jean Graverent of the same order . . . eminent doctor of theology, by apostolic authority Inquisitor of the Faith and of Heretical perversity in the whole kingdom of France’ sent greeting in the author and accomplisher of faith, Our Lord Jesus Christ. They knew of the reputation of a woman ‘of the name of Joan, commonly called the Maid’, who ‘had immodestly put on immodest garments suited to the male sex’ and who besides had the presumption to ‘perform, to speak, and to pass on many things opposed to the Catholic faith and detrimental to the articles of orthodox belief’.1 Cauchon explained how he and the Christian prince, ‘our lord the King of France and England’, had summoned the most illustrious lord the Duke of Burgundy and the lord Jean de Luxembourg to surrender this woman ‘to us, that we might, hold a complete inquiry into her acts and sayings before proceeding further, according to the Church’s laws’. The inquest was to be carried out in Rouen, beginning on 9 January 1431. Some distinguished men were asked to act as advisers: abbots Gilles of Ste-Trinité de Fécamp, doctor of sacred theology, and Nicolas de Jumièges, doctor of canon law; Pierre, prior of Longueville, doctor of theology; Raoul Roussel, treasurer of Rouen Cathedral, doctor of both canon and civil law; Nicolas de Venderès, Archdeacon of Eu, licentiate in canon law; Robert Le Barbier, licentiate in both canon and civil law; Nicolas Couppequesne, bachelor of theology, and Nicolas Loiselleur, master of arts. Jean d’Estivet, canon of the cathedral churches of Beauvais and Bayeux, was to exercise in the trial the office of prosecutor or procurator general, Master Jean de La Fontaine, master of arts and licentiate of canon law, was made councillor, commissary and examiner, and as notaries or secretaries were chosen the ‘prudent and honest’ Master Guillaume Colles, also called Boisguillaume, and Guillaume Manchon, priests, notaries by apostolic and imperial authority at the archiepiscopal court of Rouen; and Master Jean Massieu, priest, ecclesiastical dean of Rouen, was appointed executor of what was decided. The trial was recommended by the University of Paris.

  It is worth commenting briefly on some of these men. Many were officials from Normandy, which was then still firmly under English control, and most were from Rouen. Some were notable, not always for good reasons. Estivet specialised in coarse language, Lemaître in evasion; he avoided taking part in the proceedings for as long as he could and did not appear till 13 March. Others obviously depended on the English: the Abbot of Fécamp received 1,000 livres a year from them, Roussel, also in their pay, was rewarded for his long service with the archbishopric of Rouen in 1444, five years before the city fell to Charles VII. As for the University of Paris, which provided expert comment, for some years now only those in favour of the Burgundian alignment with the Anglo-French monarchy had been employed.

  The evidence against Joan was read out on 13 January, and further experts appointed. Ten days later articles were drawn up and discussed. On 13 February the officers appointed took the oath; on 19 February the court decided to summon the Inquisitor, but, as Lemaître refused to act, it wrote directly to the Inquisitor in person. Clearly the chief inquisitorial officials were not as committed to the cause as Cauchon and friends. The court reminded them that ‘heresy is a disease which creeps like a cancer, secretly killing the simple, unless the knife of the Inquisitor cuts it away’. Cauchon added that the king (that is, the child-king Henry) had graciously invited him to act in the case. In all the proceedings that followed it was Cauchon who took the lead.

  At last, at eight o’clock in the morning of 21 February, a Wednesday, the first public session was held in the chapel royal of Rouen Castle, an English property. The court announced that Joan could not go to Mass, since she wore men’s clothes. She was required to take an oath: ‘we lawfully required the said Joan to take proper oath, with her hands on the holy gospels, to speak the truth in answer to such questions put to her, as before said’. For the first time she had the chance to show how sharp she was. She replied correctly: ‘I do not know what you wish to examine me on. Perhaps you might ask such things that I would not tell.’ She was then asked if she would answer questions on the faith, to which she replied that

  concerning her father and her mother and what she had done since she had taken the road to France, she would gladly swear; but concerning the revelations from God, these she had never told or revealed to any one, save only to Charles whom she called king; nor would she reveal them to save her head; for she had them in visions or in her secret counsel; and within a week she would know certainly whether she might reveal them.

  She did take an oath to answer on questions of faith. In this, as in subsequent exchanges, she was to show she was a better lawyer than her accusers, for good inquisitorial practice did not allow them to ask her to give evidence that could be used against her, let alone to answer every question they asked her. So was established a pattern of dialogue between legalistic, moralistic, literal-minded clerics concerned with self-justification and a free spirit without any theological training.

  The first questions were routine and seemingly trivial, concerning her life at home. The overall aim of the questioning first became obvious when she was asked to say her Paternoster and she told Cauchon that if he would hear her in confession then she would gladly say it. Cauchon knew that a witch would not dare say the Paternoster: she guessed, with disconcerting shrewdness, that he would not dare hear her confession.

  Cauchon changed the subject. He forbade her to try to leave her prison: she would not promise, in case she tried to escape and succeeded. The court then ordered her to be put in chains, thus once again failing to observe good legal practice. She was defiant: ‘It is true that I wished and still wish to escape, as is lawful for any captive or prisoner.’ English soldiers, again in defiance of correct legal practice, were appointed to guard her.

  On Thursday 22 February, in the second session, after an altercation about oath-taking, she was questioned by Jean Beaupère. The court had made inquiries in her neighbourhood and learnt that she had been a pious girl, which she confirmed; the one sign that marked her out as unusual, she declared with startling assurance, was that she had heard voices. She claimed the voice she first heard ‘taught her to be good and to go to church often; and it told her that she must come to France’
. She added that Beaupère would not learn from her

  in what form that voice appeared to her. She further said this voice told her once or twice a week that she should leave and come to France, and that her father knew nothing about her intentions. She said the voice told her to come, and she could no longer stay where she was; and the voice told her again that she should raise the siege of the city of Orléans. She said too that the voice told her that she, Joan, should go to Robert de Baudricourt in the town of Vaucouleurs of which he was the captain, and he would provide an escort for her.

  She volunteered to say how she came to Vaucouleurs, how she easily recognised Robert de Baudricourt, though she had never seen him before, how her voice identified him, how it told her he would refuse her twice, how the third time he would provide her with an escort. She offered to fill in many details about her journey to Chinon, but on the question of men’s dress ‘she several times refused to answer’ and also said ‘that it was altogether necessary to change her women’s clothes for men’s’. She believed her idea was sound. At Chinon, her gift for recognising a stranger was evident once more, and this time it was the man whom she called the king; and once more she did so by the ‘advice of her voice’.