The Postcard
A postally unused carte postale, on the divided back of which is printed:
"La Douce France.
Rouen (Seine-Inférieure)
Place du Marché
Jeanne d'Arc sur son Bûcher
Maxime Réal del Sarte (Sculp.)
Les Éditions d'Art Yvon,
Paris, 14, Rue de Bretagne.
Fabrication Française."
Note the stylised flames on either side of Jeanne representing her immolation by fire.
The angelic statue of Joan of Arc is located at the north side of the Saint Joan of Arc Church in the centre of the ancient market square Place du Vieux-Marché in Rouen.
Jeanne d'Arc
Jeanne d'Arc, or Joan of Arc (c. 1412 – 30th. May 1431) was nicknamed 'The Maid of Orléans' (French: 'La Pucelle d'Orléans'). She is a heroine of France for her role during the Lancastrian phase of the Hundred Years' War, and was canonized as a Catholic saint.
She was born to Jacques d'Arc and Isabelle Romée, a peasant family, at Domrémy in the Vosges of northeast France.
Late in the Hundred Years' War, Joan claimed to have received visions of the Archangel Michael, Saint Margaret, and Saint Catherine of Alexandria instructing her to support Charles VII and recover France from English domination.
The as-yet-unanointed King Charles VII sent Joan to the Siege of Orléans as part of a relief army. She gained prominence after the siege was lifted only nine days later. Several additional swift victories led to Charles VII's consecration at Reims. This long-awaited event boosted French morale and paved the way for the final French victory at Castillon in 1453.
On the 23rd. May 1430, she was captured at Compiègne by the Burgundian faction, a group of French nobles allied with the English. She was later handed over to the English and put on trial by the pro-English bishop Pierre Cauchon on a variety of charges. After Cauchon declared her guilty, she was burned at the stake in May 1431, dying at about nineteen years of age.
In 1456, an inquisitorial court authorized by Pope Callixtus III examined the trial, debunked the charges against her, pronounced her innocent, and declared her a martyr. In the 16th. century she became a symbol of the Catholic League, and in 1803 she was declared a national symbol of France by Napoleon Bonaparte.
She was beatified in 1909 and canonized in 1920. Joan of Arc is one of the nine secondary patron saints of France, along with Saint Denis, Saint Martin of Tours, Saint Louis, Saint Michael, Saint Rémi, Saint Petronilla, Saint Radegund and Saint Thérèse of Lisieux.
Joan of Arc has remained a popular figure in literature, painting, sculpture, and other cultural works since the time of her death, and many famous writers, playwrights, filmmakers, artists, and composers have created, and continue to create, cultural depictions of her.
Rouen
Rouen is a city on the River Seine in northern France, and is relatively close to the English Channel. Formerly one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe, the population of the metropolitan area is 702,945 (2018). People from Rouen are known as Rouennais.
“Upon approaching Rouen one is sure to be struck
by the insolent daring of its situation. Lying on a
sloping plain beside the river, it seems to disdain the
well-nigh impregnable site afforded by the steep cliffs
which rise just to the northeast.
The history of the city bears out the audacity of its
location. Through all the centuries, its inhabitants
concerned themselves so continuously in conquering
other peoples that little time was left in which to
consider the security of their own homes.”
-- Charles Hitchcock Sherrill, Stained Glass Tours in France (1908).
Rouen was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy during the Middle Ages. It was one of the capitals of the Anglo-Norman dynasties, which ruled both England and large parts of modern France from the 11th. to the 15th. centuries.
From the 13th. century onwards, the city experienced a remarkable economic boom, thanks in particular to the development of textile factories and river trade. Claimed by both the French and the English during the Hundred Years' War, it was in Rouen that Joan of Arc was tried and burned alive.
Severely damaged by a wave of bombing in 1944, Rouen nevertheless regained its economic dynamism in the post-war period thanks to its industrial sites and busy seaport, which is the fifth largest in France.
Endowed with a prestige established during the medieval era, and with a long architectural heritage in its historical monuments, Rouen is an important cultural capital. Several renowned establishments are located here, such as the Museum of Fine Arts, the Secq des Tournelles Museum, and Rouen Cathedral.
“Perhaps the most characteristic feature of Rouen
when viewed from a distance is the great number
of its spires that shoot up above the housetops,
earning for it the sobriquet of the City of Churches.”
-- Charles Hitchcock Sherrill, Stained Glass Tours in France (1908).
Sadly not all of those churches are still there because of the ravages of war.
Seat of an archdiocese, Rouen also hosts a court of appeal and a university. Every four to six years, Rouen becomes the showcase for a large gathering of sailing ships called "L'Armada"; this event makes the city an occasional capital of the maritime world.
Rouen Cathedral
Rouen Cathedral was commenced in the 12th. Century on the site of an earlier structure. It has a Roman crypt.
The Butter Tower dates from the 16th. century. The name of the Tour de Beurre comes from the fact that butter was banned during Lent, and those who wished to carry on eating it had to donate 6 Deniers Tournois towards the building of the tower. Practically everyone in Rouen must have carried on eating butter in order to fund a tower like that!
The Victorian cast-iron Lantern Tower in the centre of the building made the cathedral the tallest building in the world from 1876 until 1880, when it was overtaken by Cologne Cathedral.
The Lantern Tower was designed by the architect Jean-Antoine Alavoine who proposed the use of cast iron, a modern material for the time, because it was less combustible than wood, and lighter than stone. The Lantern Tower took 50 years to construct. The 151 metre height of the spire still makes Rouen Cathedral the tallest cathedral in France.
The presence of a lantern tower at the crossing of the transept is a frequent feature in churches in Normandy (St. Ouen in Rouen, and Bayeux) and in England (Gloucester, Salisbury, and Winchester).
The lantern is in a bulge in the ironwork near the top of the spire, which is surmounted by a weathercock.
The Cathedral holds the heart of Richard the Lionheart. His bowels were buried within the church of the Château de Châlus-Chabrol in the Limousin. The cathedral seems to have got the better end of that particular deal!
Claude Monet painted a series of studies of the cathedral's façade 1894. Roy Lichtenstein also made a series of pictures of the front of the building.
The Cathedral has had to put up with a lot of wilful destruction during its lifetime:
- The Calvinists damaged much of what they could easily reach during the religious wars of the 16th. Century - the furniture, tombs, stained glass and statuary.
- The French State nationalised the building in the 18th. Century, and sold some of its furniture and statues to make money. The chapel fences were melted down to make guns.
- In WW2 the Cathedral was first bombed in 1944, taking 7 bombs. The bombs narrowly missed destroying a key pillar of the Lantern Tower, but damaged most of the south aisle, and destroyed two medieval rose windows. One of the bombs was fortunately a dud and failed to explode.
- As a consequence of a subsequent WW II bombing, the north tower, on the left of the façade, was entirely burned. During the fire the stonework calcified and the bells melted, leaving molten metal on the floor. The cathedral is still being restored after the extensive damage incurred during World War II.
Also, during the violent storm of December 1999, a copper-clad wooden turret weighing 26 tons fell into the Cathedral and damaged the choir and the stalls. The three other turrets were removed for maintenance and safety purposes before being replaced in 2012.
The Execution of Jeanne d'Arc
Jeanne d'Arc was executed not far from the Cathedral in the Vieux-Marché on Wednesday the 30th. May 1431.
The famous depiction of 19 year old Joan of Arc's execution showing her on top of a pile of wood and straw is wrong.
The site for her execution comprised a stake at the centre of a large ring of wood, with a gap left for Joan to be led to the stake. Once she was tied to the stake and the gap closed, she was hidden from sight.
One authority has suggested that her body would have burnt in the following sequence: calves, thighs and hands, torso and forearms, breasts, upper chest and face.
However in all likelihood she would have died from heatstroke, loss of blood plasma and carbon dioxide poisoning before the fire attacked the upper parts of her body.
After Jeanne had expired, the English exposed her charred body so that no-one could claim that she had escaped alive, then burned her body twice more to reduce it to ashes in order to prevent the collection of relics.
They then cast her remains into the Seine.
A modern church now stands on the site of her execution.
