Joan of Arc: From Domrémy to Rouen

Joan was born around 1412 in Domrémy, a village in the Meuse valley, to a peasant father who farmed about 20 hectares. In 1425 the village was raided and cattle were stolen. She later testified that at thirteen, around that year, the figure of Saint Michael surrounded by angels appeared to her in the garden, the first of her visions. The d'Arc family home, a listed monument since 1840, stands in the village today.

Visitor guidance: The renovated ground floor of the house is open to the public.

In May 1428 Joan asked her uncle to take her to Vaucouleurs, where she petitioned the garrison commander, Robert de Baudricourt, for an armed escort to the Dauphin's court at Chinon. He refused harshly and sent her home. She came back in January 1429 with two of his soldiers, Jean de Metz and Bertrand de Poulengy, on her side. In February he agreed to a third meeting. Before she left, her escorts and the townspeople gave her men's clothes, and six soldiers rode with her.

Location precision: Joan stayed in Vaucouleurs for several months; the sources name no single building, so the pin marks the town.

Joan reached Chinon on 6 March 1429 and stayed in the castle's Tour du Coudray. She was seventeen and Charles twenty-six when she told him she had come to raise the siege of Orléans and lead him to Reims for his coronation. Theologians at Poitiers examined her and found her a good Catholic. Returning to Chinon in April, she received supplies; a sword was fetched for her from under the altar of the church at Sainte-Catherine-de-Fierbois.

Joan entered Orléans on 29 April 1429 and met Dunois, the city's commander. She lodged for several weeks in the house of Jacques Boucher, treasurer of the Duke of Orléans. On 7 May an arrow struck her between neck and shoulder in the trench south of Les Tourelles; she returned to encourage the final assault that took the fortress. The English retreated on 8 May, ending a siege that had begun on 12 October 1428. The city still marks the day every year with a festival.

Location precision: The original house was destroyed in 1940 and rebuilt in 1965 as a museum; the pin marks that museum, while the fighting was at Les Tourelles on the south bank.

Visitor guidance: The rebuilt house is a Joan of Arc museum in the city centre.

The army left Gien on 29 June and marched on Reims. The city opened its gates on 16 July 1429, and Charles, Joan and the army entered that evening. His consecration took place the next morning, 17 July, and Joan stood in a place of honor and announced that God's will had been fulfilled. In the cathedral today a chapel holds her statue, in full armour with a banner, made in 1901; an equestrian statue stands outside.

Visitor guidance: Two statues of Joan: the equestrian one outside, and the armoured one in her chapel at the east end.

Joan reached Compiègne on 14 May 1430, and on 23 May joined a sortie from the town against the Burgundian camp at Margny. The attack failed, and Joan was captured; she surrendered to a pro-Burgundian nobleman, Lyonnel de Wandomme. The red tabard she wore over her armour made her easy for the enemy to spot. She was kept at Margny, on the right bank of the Oise, until 28 May and treated well.

Location precision: The sources place the capture at the Burgundian camp at Margny, northeast of Compiègne, without naming a spot; the pin marks Margny-lès-Compiègne.

After her capture Joan was held by Jean II de Luxembourg, and after a first failed escape attempt she was moved to Beaurevoir Castle. There she tried again, jumping from a tower window into a dry moat; she was hurt but survived. In November she was moved to Arras. The English agreed to pay 10,000 livres tournois for her, and she was sold to them on 21 November 1430. Of the castle only the cylindrical Tour Jeanne d'Arc keep on its mound, some remains of the lodgings and the broad moats survive.

Joan's trial for heresy opened in Rouen on 9 January 1431. Held by the English and guarded by male soldiers rather than by women, she was brought to the castle keep, where she was shown the instruments of torture; the assessors then voted against using them. She was not locked in this keep itself but in the nearby Tour de la Pucelle, now destroyed. The 30-metre limestone keep still stands and now houses a museum.

Visitor guidance: Between rue Bouvreuil and rue du Donjon; the keep is set up as a museum.

On the morning of 30 May 1431 Joan, about nineteen, was taken to Rouen's Old Marketplace, read her sentence and burned. She asked to see a cross; an English soldier made one from a stick, and she kissed it. Her remains were thrown into the Seine. A court later annulled the verdict and ordered a cross raised on the site. One stands beside the spot today, and the modern Church of Sainte-Jeanne-d'Arc, shaped like a Viking ship, stands on the square.

Visitor guidance: A cross marks the site on the square; excavations there exposed the old execution ground.