Joan of Arc led French forces to lift the siege of Orléans in 1429 and was later burned at the stake. Her victories helped restore French momentum during the Hundred Years’ War between England and France.
Born around 1412 in Domrémy, Joan said that divine voices instructed her to support Charles, the French heir to the throne. After gaining an audience with him, she joined the French army and became a powerful symbol of resistance. The lifting of the siege of Orléans in May 1429 was followed by further victories, including the Battle of Patay, and Charles’s coronation at Reims.
Joan was captured in 1430 by Burgundian forces allied with England. A pro-English ecclesiastical court tried her at Rouen and convicted her of heresy. She was executed there on May 30, 1431, when she was about 19 years old.
The verdict was later overturned in a rehabilitation trial in 1456. Joan was canonized by the Catholic Church in 1920 and is widely regarded as a national heroine of France.