Scott Alexander (author/host)
👤 PersonAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
I can't ask them to talk more precisely than I speak myself, but it's still really annoying.
Most first-person quotes are from the two books Régine Pernoud wrote on the topic.
Joan of Arc, By Herself and Her Witnesses, my favourite Joan of Arc book because it's mostly a primary source compilation, and The Retrial of Joan of Arc, also a primary source compilation but more focused.
This one is from By Herself and Her Witnesses, but a bunch of others will be from The Retrial.
The third-person quotes are mostly from W.P.
Barrett's translation of Her Trial.
She was sixteen when she took action, going from her village with her uncle to the Armagnac-held town of Vaucouleurs to tell the commander of the garrison, Robert de Baudricourt, that God had sent her to save the kingdom of France and that it was the will of the King of Heaven that she be delivered safely to Bourges, where the Dauphin Charles was, and could he please provide her with a horse, a sword, men's clothes and an armed escort.
He sent her home with instructions for her uncle to beat her more so she'd stop running off.
She, undaunted, returned after a few months, and this time Robert sent her away, but for some reason let her stay in Vaucouleur instead of sending her back to her family again.
At this point, Joan of Arc got dragged into a side quest when the Duke of Lorraine, her theoretical liege lord, heard rumours that there was a miracle worker around and decided to ask her to come visit him to heal his poor health.
She went to him and told him he should stop sinning with his mistress and take back his wife, but that if he gave her an armed escort to Bourges, she'd pray for him.
He, having lived with his mistress for what I would guess was more than a decade at this point and having had five children with her, gave her four francs and sent her back to Vaucouleurs.
This gave her the opportunity to hit everyone in town with Charisma 18 diplomacy checks.
Jean de Metz, a squire, spoke to her, saying, ''My dear girl, what are you doing here?
Must it not be that the king be cast out of the kingdom and we become English?''