Scott Alexander (author/host)

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The sense of atmosphere we get for the burning is that of a garrison in hostile territory who is pretty sure there's about to be a riot.

She warned Cauchon that she had made her appeal for justice to God before taking a last communion, spending her last moments with the sympathetic priest confessing her sins before being hurried down to the fire by 800 armed men.

None of the usual cries of eagerness at a burning are reported, only yelling at the English and crying for her.

Footnote here about her appeal to God.

You may have heard that God took vengeance on him, but in fact he died of a heart attack at the age of 71.

It was a different one of her accusers who mysteriously turned up dead in a sewer.

It is a wonder the city didn't riot.

Footnote.

Parnoud theorizes Bishop Cauchon was hoping she'd break at the last minute and disclaim all of her visions as fraud, which would have strengthened his hand.

The notary testifies that he attempted to edit the record after the trial to claim she did, but he was unwilling to notarize that since it didn't happen.

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Her last words were prayers to the saints and to God, ending with cries of, Jesus!

Once the flames had died down, the English swept her ashes into the river, so there wouldn't be any relics.

She was 19.

In all the haste of the day, the English had never actually convicted her of any crime.

Footnote.

In the Middle Ages, the church lacked the legal power to execute people.

All it could do was hand them over to the secular authorities, pronounced cops.

with a warning that they were unrepentant heretics, and the judge was then supposed to pronounce them guilty of the crime of heresy on that evidence and sentence them to be executed, and only then was the executioner to get to work.