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Joan of Arc, or Jeanne Date was a French saint and national heroine known as the Maid of Orleans. She was born the third of five children in Domreemy-la-Pucelle, an ancient violence of Vaucouleurs, on the Meuse River, in Eastern France on January 6, 1412. Joan's parents were rich as far as wealth of a Dom remy citizen was measured. At the time of Joan's birth, the Hundred Years War was in its last quarter and it was hard times for patriotism in France. Her heart was filled with laughter and gaiety, dutiful obedience to her parents and the church, but her heart also held pain of misfortune and war.
Joan began to have visions at a young age, most notably those of Saint Michael, Saint Catherine, and Saint Margaret. When Joan was sixteen, the state of France had gone from bad to worse. Joan's familiar saints, the Brothers of Paradise as she called them, began to visit her frequently until the day the Voice of God told her You Must Go, You Must Go. Those were the words that would forever change her life. It was at this time Joan had found it was time to fulfill her destiny. The voice of God and her saints advised her to give aid to a dauphin, later known as King Charles the VII, who was kept from the throne by the English during the Hundred Years War.
Joan began her destiny by aiding Robert de Baudricourt, who was the captain of the dauphins forces in Vaucouleurs. Joan met the dauphin at the Castle of Chinon and subjugated his cynicism about her divine mission. In the first weeks of May 1429, she led a series of successful assaults against the English bastions and so defeated and demoralized them that they raised the siege and departed on May 8. The news of the liberation of Orleans spread quickly across France and injected a new spirit of hope and resolution into the oppressed population.
This lead the way for Charles to be crowned king. The dauphin was crowned at Rheims on July 17 with Joan at his side during his coronation. This was the highlight of Joan's life. In 1430 she was captured by the Burgundians while defending Compiegne near Paris and was sold to the English. The English, in turn, handed her over to the ecclesiastical court at Rouen led by Pierre Caution, a pro-English Bishop of Beauvais, to be tried for witchcraft and heresy. During her capture and incarceration, Charles the VII made no attempt to rescue or regain Joan's freedom.
What was referred to as her most serious crime during the trial, was Joan's claim that she received direct inspiration from God. In the eyes of the church, this claim meant that Joan refused to accept the church hierarchy, therefore constituting heresy. On May 28, Joan was tried as a relapsed heretic before the secular court. On May 30, 1431, in the Old Market Place at Rouen, Joan of Arc was burned at the stake.
On July 7, 1456, twenty-five years after Joan of Arcs execution, Charles the VII recognized Joan's service to France, insisting upon a posthumous trial that annulled her verdict of guilt. In 1909, the Catholic Church in France declared a decree of beatification for Joan of Arc which recognized the deeds she performed at the cost of her life. Eleven years later, on May 16, 1920, Joan of Arc officially was recognized as a saint when Pope Benedict XV canonized her. "; " 100 "; " 631 "; " 1019787951 "; " 40439 "; " 2 "rebecca womack 20 "; "Feudalism"; "FEUDALISM The meaning of feudalism is the social and political system of Europe in the Middle ages based on personal loyalty to your lord. This practiced was used by many in the Middle Ages. For safety and for defense, people in the Middle Ages formed small communities around a central lord or master.
Most people lived on a manor, which consisted of the castle, the church, the village, and the surrounding farmland. In this feudal system, the king awarded land grants or fiefs to his most important nobles, his barons, and his bishops, in return for their contribution of soldiers for the kings armies. The feudal method of holding land was by fief and the recipient was the vassal. A vassal was an individual who served a lord in a military capacity.
The fief was formally acquired following the ceremony of homage. The practice of vassalage was executed when warriors swore an oath of loyalty to their leader. They fought for their leader, and he in turn took care of their needs Nobles divided their land among the lesser nobility, who became so powerful that the kings had difficulty controlling them. In an ideal feudal society, the ownership of all land was vested in the king. Beneath him were the nobles. For nearly five hundred years warfare in Europe consisted of heavily armed calvary, otherwise known as knights.
These knights came to have the greatest social prestige of all. When the government began to break down, many powerful nobles took control of large areas of land. They of course needed men to fight for them, so they proceeded to give grants of land to vassals who in return would fight for their lord. This land gave support for the vassal and his family. Land was the most important gift that could be given to a vassal. Both the vassal and his lord benefited from each other.
Vassals were also responsible for aids, which were financial payments to their lord. The lord likewise had responsibilities toward his vassal. His main priority was to protect him, of course, but also for the maintenance of him. A manor was an agricultural estate run by a lord and worked by his peasants.
Manor lism came about from the unsettles circumstances in the Early Middle Ages, when small farmers often needed protection or food in a time of bad harvests. At the lowest echelon of society were the peasants. In exchange for living and working on his land, known as the demesne, the lord offered his peasants protection. This caused free peasants to give up their freedom just to be protected and have use of the lords land. Many free peasants then became serfs or villeins. These were peasants that were bound to the land and had to give labor services, pay rent, and be subject to the lords jurisdiction.
These labor services included working the lords demesne, which was the land retained by the lord. Another part of the labor services was building barns and digging ditches. These serfs generally worked about three days a week for their lord. The way the serfs paid rent was to give their lords a share of each product. They also paid their lord for use of his pastureland's and woodlands. Because the serfs were not free, their lord had many legal rights over them.
Serfs could not lead their lords land without permission. Serfs were allowed to get married, but they could not marry anyone outside their manor without the lords approval. Lords sometimes tried peasants in their own courts. This court system was the only law that the peasants knew.
These peasants also had to pay the lord for certain services, such as bringing grain to them and grind it into flour. The lord controlled the lives and properties of his serfs on his manor due to the rights he possessed.
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Research essay sample on Hundred Years War Joan Of Arc
