Joan Of Arc :: essays research papers

On the night of the feast of the Epiphany (January 6th) at the end of the Christmas season, in the year 1412 during the final waning period of the relative peace secured by the Truce pf Leulinghen, a baby was born to Jacques Darc and his wife Isabelle in the village of Domremy. She was christened Jehanne (â€Å"Joan†) after her godmothers Jehanne Royer and Jehanne de Viteau. Her childhood was spent among the forests and strawberry- covered fields of the Meuse River valley, far from the northern regions where the political situation was becoming increasingly troubled. Against the problems that were occurring around them, members of the Darc family continued to farm their 50-some acres of land near the Meuse. According to the Domremy villagers whom later testified to Jehanne’s childhood upbringing, she was a dutiful child who helped her parents with the chore along with her other siblings: her three older brothers Jacquemin, Jean, and Pierre, and her little sister Catherine. She was deeply devoted to God and the Blessed Virgin. She also loved the ringing of the church bells.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In 1414 her father rented the nearby Chateau de I'll from a local aristocratic family to serve as a secure sanctuary for the villagers and their livestock. In 1420 when Jehanne was eight, the Treaty of Troyes granted Henry V eventual title to the kingdom of France and the hand of Catherine, daughter of King Charles. In 1422 Henry V and Charles VI died within two months of each other, leaving the infant Henry VI as the nominal King of France.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Around that time, perhaps in the summer of 1424, the young farm girl from Domremy said she began to experience visions. She would later explain: â€Å"I was in my thirteenth year when I heard a voice from God to help me govern my conduct. And the first time I was very much afraid. And this voice came, about the hour of noon, in the summer time, in my father’s garden...† A new chapter had begun for Jehanne and the various factions fighting for control of the Kingdom of France.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  She believed that the voices came from God. She said the first of the voices were of Saint Michael. The voices told her two to three times a week that she must go away and that I must come to France; and my father knew nothing of my leaving.