The Maid and the Queen (29 page)

HE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS
was without question the most distinguished and influential school of theology in fifteenth-century Europe. Those of its students who managed to survive the grueling course of study—six years of preparatory work in the general arts followed by a further nine years under the exacting tutelage of the faculty of theology—were more or less assured a lucrative path to prominence among the priesthood. An institution as vast and complex as the medieval Church had a never-ending need for competent officials to tend to the administration of its many benefices, and the best of these positions—canon, dean, bishop, archbishop, cardinal—were disproportionately populated by masters of theology from the University of Paris. As these ecclesiastic appointments all boasted an income stream or “living” that was pocketed by their administrators, masters of theology could also hope to attain great wealth in addition to eminence. Naturally, there was considerable competition for the better assignments—
the larger and more prestigious the diocese, the more profitable the living. Moreover, those who succeeded in ascending to the upper regions of the Church hierarchy could expect to hold positions of authority in the courts of secular princes as well. High-ranking ecclesiastics and masters of theology were in great demand as ambassadors and counselors, and were royally rewarded for their efforts with gifts of money or additional benefices. This symbiotic convergence of Church and state ensured that the University of Paris functioned as a political institution as much as an academic one—perhaps more so.

Consequently, the school and its various officials did not stand coolly above the civil passions that gripped the rest of the kingdom. Rather, the masters of theology had played a prominent role in the war since its inception. As in the general population, some of its members had favored the Armagnac position while others supported the Burgundians. The fortunes of each side had risen and fallen with the pace of the conflict, and with the triumph of Henry V, the Armagnac masters, even those who were revered for their erudition, had been forced to flee Paris and had taken refuge with Charles, who made use of their services. Similarly, the remaining masters, all Burgundian partisans, welcomed the English occupation and threw the full force of the university behind Henry V and his successors.

As might be expected, the influence of the Maid on the course of the war, her hold on the public consciousness, and in particular her assertion that she came as a messenger from God aroused the extreme umbrage of those Burgundian masters who now controlled the theological faculty. This ire had become further inflamed when some of their former colleagues, the exiled Armagnac masters acting for Charles, had examined Joan at Poitiers and approved her mission, in effect declaring her to be a prophetess. The crowning blow had fallen when, immediately following the raising of the siege of Orléans, the great Armagnac theologian Jean Gerson, a former chancellor of the university and the most esteemed academician of the period, published a prodigiously learned monograph on the subject of the Maid, in which, citing the relevant cases of Divine Law, he asserted that Joan was not forbidden from assuming male attire. His thesis was subsequently reinforced by the archbishop of Embrun, another Armagnac scholar, who justified Joan’s wardrobe as not only necessary to her occupation but required as, in her case, being constantly in the presence of warriors, it was a matter of decency. It was at this point that the question of the divine nature of Joan’s mission was
raised to the level of a faculty disagreement, and the University of Paris was a place that took its faculty disagreements very seriously. In the previous century, a chancellor had been hauled up on charges before the pope and ultimately dismissed from his post over a dispute arising from the order of seating preference at the annual end-of-term banquet.

With the capture of Joan at Compiègne, the Burgundian masters saw their chance. They dispatched a letter to Philip the Good in the name of the Inquisitor of France entreating that the Maid be delivered to the university as soon as possible to stand trial for false doctrine. “Whereas all faithful Christian princes and all other true Catholics are required to extirpate all errors arising against the faith… and that it be now of common renown that by a certain woman named Joan whom the adversaries of this kingdom call the Maid, have been in several cities, good towns and other places of this kingdom, broadcast and published… diverse errors… we implore you of good affection, you, most puissant prince… that the soonest and most safely and conveniently it can be done, be sent and brought prisoner to us the said Joan, vehemently suspected of many crimes smacking of heresy, to appear before us and a procurator of the Holy Inquisitor, to answer and proceed as in reason bound,” they wrote. The extent of the university’s desire to repudiate their former colleagues’ arguments may be measured by the speed with which they proceeded. Word of the Maid’s apprehension reached Paris on May 25; the letter was dated May 26.

The duke of Burgundy, having received this communication, went to interview Joan on June 6 and there met with his vassal, John of Luxembourg. Although there is no record of their conversation, it is likely they discussed what should be done with her. Apparently this did not include simply handing her over to the university, as no move was made in that direction. The theological faculty, failing to obtain a satisfactory response to its first salvo, recognized that stronger measures were called for and handed the responsibility for securing Joan to a man uniquely qualified to accomplish the task: Pierre Cauchon, the bishop of Beauvais.

The career of Pierre Cauchon was a conspicuous example of the advantages to be drawn through the assiduous massaging of the shared ambitions of Church and state. A former rector—a position equivalent to head of school—and an impassioned mouthpiece for the Burgundian agenda, Cauchon had thrown the full weight of the university behind the duke of Burgundy and the English occupation. Under his supervision, the theological
faculty had provided the intellectual and scholastic arguments, known as the “theory of the double monarchy,” which had justified the crowning of Henry V, and he himself had helped to negotiate the Treaty of Troyes, by which agreement the dauphin had been disinherited. For these services, Cauchon had been rewarded with the bishopric of Beauvais by the duke of Burgundy. Since then, he had so ingratiated himself with the duke of Bedford that he succeeded in having himself appointed as a counselor to Henry VI, a position for which he was compensated by a stipend of 1,000 livres, paid by the English treasury.

Recently, however, Cauchon’s career had stalled. Despite his best efforts to prove his worth to his English employers over the previous decade, he was still only a bishop. Still, Cauchon had hope, for just at the time of Joan’s capture, the archbishopric of Rouen, a particularly valuable diocese, fell vacant. There would of course be strong competition for the posting, so the bishop of Beauvais knew that he would have to perform a meaningful service to the duke of Bedford to secure the appointment. The procurement of Joan for trial and punishment presented itself as a happy confluence of interests. It was no great secret that the English wanted the Maid delivered into their hands for execution.

And Cauchon had his own grudge against Joan. He had been in Reims just prior to Charles’s coronation, and with the coming of Joan and her army had been forced to flee in a manner that he considered most unbecoming to his position. He had subsequently taken refuge in his home bishopric of Beauvais, only to be forced out a second time when, in the aftermath of the coronation, this city too had embraced Charles’s side in the war. Even more ominously for Joan, the fall of Beauvais to the opposition did worse than ruffle Cauchon’s vanity; it deprived him of the living associated with his bishopric, and Pierre Cauchon was not a man who took a loss of income lightly.

Thus inspired, the bishop of Beauvais fell to work, opening a channel of communication between the duke of Bedford and the University of Paris. Although there was some feeling within the English camp that the best strategy with regard to the Maid was simply to force the duke of Burgundy to hand her over, tie her into a sack, and drown her in the river, Cauchon was soon able to make his allies see the political advantages of the Inquisition’s first publicly trying her and condemning her for heresy. By obtaining the imprimatur of the Holy Church—for Joan would certainly be found guilty—those among the opposition whom she had beguiled would be
undeceived, and Charles and his Armagnac theological advisers discredited and humiliated. Moreover, as the punishment for heresy (which, as everyone knew, was to be burned at the stake) was always carried out by the secular authority within whose jurisdiction the trial was held, the En glish would ultimately have the satisfaction of executing Joan in the most painful way possible.

The merits of this plan to both sides were so obvious that it took very little time to work out the details. On July 14, 1430, at a private audience, Pierre Cauchon was able to personally hand John of Luxembourg an official summons. “It is by this that it is required by the Bishop of Beauvais of my lord the Duke of Burgundy and of my lord John of Luxembourg… in the name on behalf of the King our sire [Henry VI] and on his own behalf as Bishop of Beauvais: that the woman who is commonly called Joan the Maid, prisoner, be sent to the King to be delivered over to the Church to hold her trial because she is suspected and defamed to have committed many crimes, sortileges, idolatry, invocations of enemies and other several cases touching our faith and against that faith.” The document was strongly worded, but it was not upon language that the bishop of Beauvais relied to ensure the success of his mission. With these papers came the offer of a ransom of 10,000 livres tournois drawn on the English treasury.

To have a ransom paid by the enemy was definitely not what the chivalric process had intended. As word of the offer leaked out, Charles was provoked to a semblance of action. He sent an embassy to the Burgundians in which he informed them sharply that “they should not for anything in the world lend themselves to such a transaction or, if they did, he would inflict similar treatment on those of their party whom he had in his hands.” This was largely a hollow threat—it is unlikely that the king of Scotland, for example, would pay much for a Burgundian prisoner of war—but it demonstrates that this course of action was unusual enough that it had not been anticipated by the French side. The king also responded by sending military aid to Compiègne, which was being besieged by the Burgundians. It is true that Charles did not offer a competing ransom (not that he had the money), but to do so would have been pointless; the English would never have allowed the duke of Burgundy to return Joan to the French. They feared her effect on the civilian population and the war too much. The best result Charles could hope for was that she be allowed to remain where she was.

Ten thousand livres tournois was not a tremendous sum, but it was still
a good deal of money, and gives a sense of just how badly the English wanted Joan delivered into their hands. And yet John of Luxembourg hesitated. He was surrounded by women who were sympathetic to Joan and who had no love of the English. He had married Joan of Béthune, whose first husband, Robert, duke of Bar, had been killed fighting against Henry V at Agincourt. Robert had been Yolande of Aragon’s uncle, so Joan of Béthune was her aunt by marriage.
^*
The Maid had an even stronger advocate in the person of John’s elderly aunt, the lady of Luxembourg, who had stood as godmother to Charles VII at his christening, and appears to have promised her nephew that she would make him her heir if he would refuse the English offer. Joan herself reported, “The lady of Luxembourg asked my lord of Luxembourg that I not be delivered to the English.”

Despite this promise of protection, Joan, who was under no illusions as to what Cauchon’s offer meant, spent the summer and early fall in terror of being sold to her enemies and begged her voices to help her. “I would rather die than be put in the hands of the English,” she told Saint Catherine, whom Joan claimed responded that “God would aid me and also the people of Compiègne.” So overpowering was Joan’s dread that despite her angel’s reassurance and against her explicit instructions, the prisoner eventually despaired and threw herself from the window of the high tower in which she was being held. The injuries Joan sustained in this fall were so severe that at first her Burgundian jailers believed her to be dead, and it was several days before she recovered sufficiently to be able even to eat or drink. Asked later by her inquisitors, “What was the reason you jumped from the tower of Beaurevoir?” Joan replied, “I had heard that all the people of Compiègne beyond the age of seven would be subjected to fire and sword, and I preferred to die rather than to live after such a destruction of good people, and that was one of the reasons why I jumped; and the other was that I knew that I had been sold to the English, and I would have preferred to die rather than to be in the hands of the English, my enemies.”