St. Joan of Arc
An unlettered peasant girl who heard voices in her father's garden, led France's armies to break the siege of Orléans, saw a king crowned — and was burned as a heretic at nineteen by the Church that would one day make her a saint.
Timeline of St. Joan of Arc
- c. 1412
Born in Domrémy
Born to Jacques d'Arc and Isabelle Romée, a devout peasant family in a village loyal to the French crown on the war-torn frontier of Lorraine.
- c. 1425
The voices begin
At about thirteen she began to hear what she said were the voices of St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret, telling her to be good and, in time, to save France.
- February 1429
Vaucouleurs
After being twice turned away, she persuaded the captain Robert de Baudricourt to give her an escort to the Dauphin — having foretold a French defeat near Orléans that proved true.
- March 1429
Chinon
She picked the disguised Dauphin Charles out of his court and won his trust, then was examined for three weeks by churchmen at Poitiers before being given a role in the army.
- 8 May 1429
The siege of Orléans lifted
Riding in white armour with her own standard, she rallied the assaults that broke the English siege in days — wounded by an arrow but returning to the field. France called her the Maid of Orléans.
- 18 June 1429
Victory at Patay
Her army routed the English in open field, shattering the myth of English invincibility and opening the road to Reims.
- 17 July 1429
Coronation at Reims
Charles VII was crowned in the traditional coronation cathedral, Joan standing beside him with her banner.
- September 1429
Repulse at Paris
Wounded in a failed assault on Paris; the king made a truce and her influence at court began to fade.
- 23 May 1430
Captured at Compiègne
Pulled from her horse and taken by Burgundian soldiers, she was sold to the English for 10,000 livres while Charles did nothing to ransom her.
- 1431
Trial at Rouen
Tried for heresy by a church court under Bishop Pierre Cauchon, she answered her judges with disarming shrewdness for months while held in a secular prison.
- 30 May 1431
Burned at the stake
Condemned as a relapsed heretic, she was burned in the Old Market Place of Rouen at about nineteen, calling on the name of Jesus until the end.
- 1456
Conviction annulled
A retrial ordered by the pope and the king declared the original trial null and cleared her name.
- 1920
Canonized
Pope Benedict XV declared her a saint — the only person ever both condemned and canonized by the Catholic Church.
