The main charge brought against Joan of Arc at her 1431 trial was heresy. The proceedings took place in Rouen under the authority of an ecclesiastical court associated with the English administration.
The court examined Joan’s claims that divine voices had guided her, her obedience to those voices, and aspects of her conduct and clothing. Her wearing of male clothing became a major issue in the proceedings, but the formal case centered on heresy and related religious accusations.
Joan was not tried by a standard royal criminal court for treason, even though her military service supported Charles VII against the English and their allies. This distinction matters because popular summaries sometimes call the trial a treason trial.
She was convicted and executed in 1431. In the 1450s, a rehabilitation trial investigated the earlier proceedings and declared the original judgment unjust. The later decision did not erase the historical trial; it formally reversed its condemnation.