1426, Criminals, p. 208

In the first week of January 1425 labouring men brought a great petition to Paris against thieving brigands who were all around Paris for a distance of some twelve, sixteen, and twenty leagues. They did more harm than I can tell and had no allegiance or banner; they were poor gentlemen who thus turned robber, day and night. Upon hearing the petition, the Provost of Paris summoned the forces of the city Sixty, archers and crossbowmen, and led them promptly to the robbers' reported base. In less than a week he had taken over two hundred of them and sent them off to various prisons in the nearest good towns. On Wednesday, 9th January 1425 he brought two wagon-loads of the worst of them to Paris - there were only about twenty of these.

1426, Daily Life, p. 209

Next June, on St. John's night itself, 1426, the water rose so high all over France that, after the fires had been lit and people were dancing round it and it had begun to die down, the river overflowed and began to put the fire out. People hurriedly gathered up what they could of the fire and what unburnt wood there was and took it to the Cross and finished burning it there. But within four or six days the water rose past the Cross, and all the Marais in Paris were full of water. This began in early June, and not until the 10th or 12th July - at least forty days altogether - did it go down so as to be at all passable. The crops from the low-lying lands were lost. A general procession was made because of the floods in the week after St. John's day, on the Wednesday before St. Peter and St. Paul, very solemn and moving.

1427, Marginals-gypsies, pp. 216-219

On the Sunday after mid-August day, August 17th 1427, twelve penitents as they called themselves came to Paris - one duke, one count, and ten other men, all on horseback. They said that they were good Christians; they came from Lower Egypt. Also they said that they had been Christians formerly; it was not long since the Christians had conquered them and their whole country and compelled them all to become Christians or be killed. Those who accepted baptism continued lords of that country as before and promised to be good and loyal and keep the law of Christ until death. They had a king and a queen in their country, who retained their sovereignty because they became Christians. And, they said, some time after they had received the Christian faith, the Saracens made war upon them. As they were but weak in our faith, they, for very little cause, enduring but a brief attack and making but little attempt to do their duty and defend their country, surrendered to their enemies, became Saracens again, and denied Our Lord. What happened next was that certain Christian lords - the Emperor of Germany, the King of Poland, and others - heard that they had thus falsely and easily abandoned our faith, so soon turning Saracens and idolaters again, and made war upon them. They yielded very soon, as if they supposed that they would again be left in their own country as long as they became Christians. But the Emperor and the other lords, after much deliberation, said that they should never hold land in their country without the Pope's consent and that they must go to Rome, to the Holy Father. There they all went, old and young, and a hard journey it was for the children. When they got there they made general confession of their sins. The Pope, having heard their confession, after much thought and consultation imposed on them this penance: that for seven years they should go to and fro about the world without ever sleeping in a bed. He also ordered, it was said, that so as to provide some means for them every bishop and every abbot who bore a crosier should give them, once, ten pounds tournois. He gave them letters about this addressed to the prelates of the church, blessed them, and so they departed. They had been wandering for five years before they came to Paris, where they arrived on 17th August, these twelve already mentioned, and their common people arrived on the Beheading of St. John the Baptist. These were not allowed into Paris but were lodged at La Chappelle-St.-Denis by the authorities. There were not more than a hundred of them altogether, or six score or so, men, women, and children. When they left their own land there had been ten or twelve hundred of them, but the others had died on the way, also their king and their queen. The survivors still hoped for worldly possessions, since the Holy Father had promised them that he would give them a good and fertile land to live in when once they should sincerely have completed their penance. You never saw greater crowds going to the Lendit benediction than went flocking to La Chappelle to see them while they were there. People went from Paris, from St. Denis, and from all around the city. And, indeed, their children were very, very clever, both the girls and the boys. Most of them - almost all of them - had their ears pierced and wore a silver ring in each ear, or two rings in each. This, they said, was a mark of good birth in their country. The men were very dark, with curly hair; the women were the ugliest you ever saw and the darkest, all with scarred faces and hair as black as a horse's tail. They had no dresses but an old coarse piece of blanket tied on the shoulder with a bit of cloth or string; under this all their covering was a wretched smock or shift. In short, they were the poorest creatures that anyone had ever seen come into France. But in spite of their poverty they had sorceresses among them who looked at people's hands and told them what had happened to them or what would happen. They brought trouble into many marriages, for they would say to the husband, 'Your wife has cuckolded you', or to the wife, 'Your husband has deceived you'. What was worse, it was said that when they talked to people they contrived - either by magic arts or by other means, or by the devil's help or by their own skill and cunning - to make money flow out of other people's purses into their own. I must say I went there three or four times to talk to them and could never see that I lost a penny, nor did I see them looking into anyone's hands, but everyone said they did. Word of this came to the Bishop of Paris, and he went to see them, taking with him a Minorite called the little Jacobin who, at the Bishop's order, preached an excellent sermon, excommunicating all the men and women who had done this and who had believed their claims and had had their hands looked at. They had to go, and so on Lady Day in September they departed and set off for Pontoise.

1427, Criminals, pp. 221-222, 226

On December 15th an esquire called Sauvage de Fremainville was captured by force in the castle of l'Isle Adam, along with two servants, all that were with him when he was taken. He was quickly bound and put on a horse, hatless, his hands and feet tied, and so taken to Bagnolet where the Regent was, who at once ordered that they should go and hang him immediately, without delay, and without having his defence - they were very much afraid he would be rescued, for he was of very great lineage. So he was brought to the gallows, accompanied by the Provost of Paris and several other men, also by one Pierre Baillé, originally a shoemaker's boy in Paris, then tipstaff, then Receiver of Paris, and now Grand Treasurer of Maine. This Pierre Baillé, when Le Sauvage wanted to make his confession, refused to let him live so long but made him climb the ladder at once and climbed two or three steps up after him, shouting at him. Le Sauvage did not reply to his liking, so this Pierre gave him a great blow with a stick and gave the hangman five or six too, because he was talking to him about his soul's salvation. The hangman, seeing Baillé's ill will, was afraid he might do something worse to him, and so, being frightened, hurried more than he ought to have done and hanged Le Sauvage; but because of his haste the rope broke or came undone and the condemned man fell and broke his back and one leg. Yet he had to climb up again, suffering as he was, and was hanged and strangled. Indeed, he was held in very great disfavour, particularly on account of several very horrible murders. It was said that in Flanders or Hainaut he had killed a bishop with his own hands.

On Friday 10th September 1428 the body of Sauvage de Fremainville was taken down from the Paris gibbet. He was the man whom Pierre Baillé treated so brutally whilst he was being hanged, beating him viciously as he climbed the ladder, also hitting the hangman with a heavy stick. This Pierre was at that time Receiver of Paris.

1429, Witchcraft, pp. 230-232

The Duke of Burgundy returned to Paris on 4th April, St. Ambrose's day, with a splendid company of knights and squires.

About a week later a grey friar called Brother Richard arrived in Paris. He was a man of great judgement, wise in prayer, a sower of sound doctrine for his neighbour's edification. He worked tremendously at this task; one could scarcely believe it without having seen it - all the time he was in Paris he preached every single day except one. He began on Saturday, 16th April 1429 at St. Geneviève, and the next Sunday and the week after, i.e. the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, at the Innocents. He would begin to preach at about five o'clock in the morning and go on till between ten and eleven o'clock and there were always five or six thousand people listening to him. He preached from a high platform - it was nearly one and a half toises high - with his back to the charnel-houses opposite the Charronnerie near the Danse Macabré.

On the day of the Finding of St. Denis the Duke of Burgundy went away to his own land of Flanders. Orleans was still besieged, which made food dearer than ever in Paris, since the town was frequently compelled to send large quantities of flour and other victuals and things necessary for siege warfare to Orleans. In short, so much was sent there that from one Saturday to the next corn rose from 2s. p. to 40s. p, and everything else that can keep a man alive increased similarly. Thus, as is said above, the Duke of Burgundy went away, without having done anything towards peace or for the poor people. It was said that he was going to fight the Liégeois.

The grey friar mentioned earlier preached on St. Mark's day at Boulogne-la-Petite and there were great crowds there, as is said above. Indeed, when they came away from the sermon that day, the people of Paris were so moved and so stirred up to devotion that in less than three or four hours' time you would have seen over a hundred fires alight in which men were burning chess and backgammon boards, dice, cards, balls and sticks, mirelis and every kind of covetous game that can give rise to anger and swearing. The women, too, this day and the next, burned in public all their fine headgear - the rolls and stuffing, the pieces of leather or whalebone that they used to stiffen their headdresses or make them fold forwards. Noblewomen left off their horns, their trains, and many of their vanities. Indeed, the ten sermons he preached in Paris and one at Boulogne did more to turn people towards piety than all the preachers who had preached in Paris for the past hundred years. He said that he had recently returned from Syria, also from Jerusalem, and that he had there encountered many crowds of Jews, with whom he had talked. They told him for a fact that the Messiah was born, that this Messiah was to give them back their inheritance, that is, the Promised Land; they were all flocking towards Babylon. According to Holy Scripture, this Messiah is Antichrist, who is to be born in the city of Babylon, once capital of the Persian kingdoms, to be brought up in Bethsaida, and to spend his youth in Chorazin - cities to which Our Lord said Vhe, Vhe, tibi Bethsaida! Vhe, Vhe, Chorazin! Brother Richard preached his last sermon in Paris on Tuesday, the day after St. Mark's day 26th April 1429, and when he went away he said that the coming year, i.e. the year 30, would see the greatest wonders that had ever happened and that his master Brother Vincent¹, bears witness to this out of the Apocalypse and the writings of St. Paul; it is also witnessed to by Brother Bernard², one of the great preachers of the world, as Brother Richard is also said to be. Brother Bernard was at this time preaching beyond the alps in Italy, where he had turned more people towards piety than all the preachers who had preached there for two hundred years gone by. And, indeed, on that Tuesday when Brother Richard finished his last sermon, the tenth, because he had not got permission to preach in Paris any more, when he said goodbye and commended the people of Paris to God and they should pray for him and he would pray to God for them, everyone, great and small, cried and wept as bitterly and as feelingly as if they had been watching their dearest friends being buried, and so did he too. This good man intended to have set off that day or the next for Burgundy, but his brothers managed to persuade him to stay in Paris and confirm by further preaching the good beginning he had made. It was at this time that he had a number of mandrakes burned. Many stupid people kept these things hidden away - they believed so strongly in this muck that they really thought that as long as they had one and kept it all nicely wrapped up in fine silk or linen they would be rich all the days of their life. There were certainly some who gave them up willingly when they heard how severely the good man spoke of people who believed in this folly; they swore that all the time they had kept these things they had never once been worth more than they owed, but they had always hoped very much that at some time in the future they would bring them great riches; this was all due to the advice of certain old women who think to know too much, meddling with such wickednesses, which are pure witchcraft and heresy.

1429, Joan of Arc, pp. 233-234

There was at this time a Maid, as they called her, in the Loire country who claimed to be able to foretell the future and who used to say 'Such a thing will certainly happen'. She was altogether opposed to the Regent of France and his supporters. And it was said that in spite of all the forces in front of Orleans she made her way into the city, bringing in large numbers of Armagnacs and a good supply of provisions, and that none of the army made any move to stop her, although they could see them going by about one or two bowshots away from them and although they needed food so desperately that one man could well have eaten three, blanc's worth of bread at one meal. Other things were said of her too, by those who loved the Armagnacs better than the Burgundians or the Regent of France, such as that, when she was very small and looked after the sheep, birds would come from the woods and fields when she called them and eat bread in her lap as if they were tame. In veritate appocrisium est. The Armagnacs now raised the siege and forced the English to retreat from before Orleans. But they went, it is said, to Vendôme and took that. This Maid went everywhere with the Armagnacs, wearing armour and carrying her banner, which bore the one word, 'Jesus'. It was said that she told an English commander to leave the siege with all his men or they would all come to grief and shame. He answered her abusively, calling her bitch and tart; she told him that in spite of them all they would very soon all be gone but that he would not see it and that many of his men would be killed. And so it happened, for he was drowned the day before the slaughter. Afterwards he was fished up, cut in quarters, boiled and embalmed, and taken to St. Merry, where he remained for a week or ten days in the chapel in front of the crypt. Four candles or torches burned before his body night and day; then it was taken to his own country for burial.

1429, Preaching, pp. 234-235

Brother Richard now went away. On the Sunday before he was to go it was said all over Paris that he was going to preach at or near the place where the glorious martyr my lord St. Denis was beheaded, and many other martyrs. Over six thousand people therefore went there from Paris, most of them leaving in great crowds on the Saturday night so as to have better places in the morning. They slept in the open country in old shacks or wherever they could, but the sermon was cancelled. Why this was I shall not say, but he did not preach, at which the good people were much upset. He preached no more in Paris at this time and had to go away.

1429, Childbirth, pp. 235-236

On 6th June 1429, at Aubervilliers, were born two children who were exactly like this sketch. I myself saw them and held them in my hands; they had as you see two heads, four arms, two necks four legs, four feet, but only one belly and one navel; two heads, two backs. They were christened and were kept above ground for three days so that the people of Paris could see this remarkable phenomenon. Indeed, more than ten thousand people, men and women, went from Paris to see them. By Our Lord's mercy, the mother was delivered safe and sound. They were born at about seven in the morning and were christened in the parish of St. Christopher, the right-hand child being named Agnes, the left-hand, Jeanne - their parents' names were Jean and Gillette Discret. They lived for one hour after they had been baptized.

¹ St. Vincent Ferrier, born in Valencia c. 1350 of English/Spanish parents; a Dominican who preached amongst Jews and Moslems and all over Europe; died in 1419.
² St. Bernardino of Siena (1380-1444), an Observant Franciscan; known as 'the people's preacher'.