🔥 Joan of Arc: The Teenage Girl Who Spanked the English, Freaked Out the Church, and Rocked a Bob Cut ...
A satirical-analytical article exploring the mystique, the trial, and the epic WTF legacy of the Maid of Orléans.
THE PEASANT GIRL WHO ROSE FROM MILKING COWS TO MAKING KINGS
Domrémy, France—Picture it: a teenage peasant girl named Jehanne la Pucelle, who didn’t even know her last name, leading armored knights into battle and telling Charles VII, “Put this crown on and let’s party.” Joan of Arc wasn’t your average 15th-century peasant. She was illiterate, had visions of St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret, and dressed like a man because medieval battlefields weren’t exactly sewing circles.
Her divine pep talks turned her into France’s battlefield mascot and the world’s most famous teenage cross-dresser. And as it turns out, that’s exactly what got her in hot water with the English—who were, let’s be honest, a little tired of getting their butts handed to them by a French farm girl.
JOAN’S ‘INAPPROPRIATE’ DRESS CODE: WTF LEVELS MAXED
At her trial, the English and their ecclesiastical cheerleaders had one main beef with Joan: her fashion sense. Forget the part where she routed them at Orléans or inspired Frenchmen to stop playing medieval footsie and start fighting back—no, the real scandal was that she wore pants.
The trial transcripts read like medieval Mean Girls:
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Accusation 1: “She wore men’s clothes.”
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Accusation 2: “She says God told her to do it.”
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Accusation 3: “WTF, is she possessed or just French?”
Joan’s defense? “If you’d been locked in a castle full of English soldiers, you’d wear pants too.” And she had a point. She claimed it was to protect her modesty—because nothing says “self-respect” like a suit of chainmail.
THE TRIAL: 70 CHARGES, 12 ARTICLES, ONE FLAMING ENDING
Joan’s trial was basically a medieval Twitter pile-on, minus the hashtags. The charges included:
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Sorcery (because obviously).
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Heresy (the voices told her to crown Charles, not Henry VI).
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Wearing men’s clothes (because apparently, that’s the real sin).
It all boiled down to one question: Who does God want running France? The English said “us,” Joan said “non.”
The judges told her to recant or face the barbecue. She caved—briefly. She signed a confession she probably didn’t understand, agreed to wear a dress, and was spared the flames. For four days.
Then she switched back to trousers and said, “JK, my voices are back.” Cue the heresy label, the collective pearl-clutching, and the very medieval solution: tie her to a stake and set her on fire.
THE REAL REASON: POLITICS, POLITICS, POLITICS
Here’s the kicker: Joan wasn’t really burned because she was a cross-dressing farm girl. It was because she said God told her to get the English out of France. In medieval PR terms, that was like saying “England is a dumpster fire and I’m the water bucket.”
Historian Daniel Hobbins nailed it: Joan’s voices were political. If she was right, the English claim to France was toast. If she was wrong, they could keep collecting taxes. So they stuck her on a pyre and hoped the problem would vanish in the smoke. Spoiler: it didn’t.
AFTER THE FLAMES: JOAN’S GLOW-UP
Ironically, killing Joan made her immortal.
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1450: The French said, “Oops, our bad,” and launched a retrial that cleared her name.
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1909: Beatified at Notre Dame.
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1920: Canonized as a saint.
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20th century: Inspired a bob haircut that’s still around, even if the Inquisition isn’t.
SURPRISING FACTS THAT ARE STRANGER THAN FICTION
THE LEGACY: BLAZING THROUGH HISTORY
So why was Joan of Arc burned? Because she said the quiet part out loud. Because she refused to bow down. Because she wore pants when the world told her to wear petticoats.
And because sometimes the simplest act—speaking up for what you believe in—can terrify empires more than any army.
In the end, they burned her body, but not her story. She was the teenage girl who defied the English, outwitted the Church, and rewrote the rules of gender, war, and faith.
From Domrémy to the stake in Rouen, Joan’s story is a testament to the power of a single voice—echoing louder than any bishop, any king, and certainly any English invader.
And centuries later, she’s still telling them: “I will wear what I want, fight how I must, and speak the truth—no matter how many pyres you build.”
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