Cross-dressing, Gender Identity, and Sexuality of Joan of Arc - Historical Perspective

Historical Perspective

During and immediately following her life, perspectives on Joan varied widely, often (although not always) along continental lines. Rumor of a woman leading an opposing army was historically used to incite troops against the obvious heresy, sorcery, and immorality. Comments from English soldiers at the time concerning Joan range from referring to her as a "bloody tart" to asking "whether she expected to surrender to a woman" and referring to her troops as "unbelieving pimps". The English author of The Brut claimed that her troops followed her by "crafte of sorcerie". After his defeat at Orleans, Bedford reported to the English crown that his men had been bewitched by a satanic agent in the form of a woman dressed as a man. Crane notes that she was referred to as "femme monstrueuse," "femme désordonnée et diffamée, estant en habit d'homme et de gouvernement disslut" ("monstrous woman, disorderly and notorious woman who dresses in men's clothes, whose conduct is dissolute").

On the other side of the English channel, the situation was largely reversed. From the beginning, for whatever reason, there was surprisingly little hesitation on the side of the French. Of special note was the loyalty given to her by her soldiers, who were among the most skilled in France. The Bourgeois of Paris claimed that this was because, "all who disobeyed her should be killed without mercy", but the author of the Journal du siege d'Orleans noted that "All regarded her with much affection, men and women, as well as small children." Jean de Macon, an eyewitness to the siege of Orleans, noted that there was only one derision, while the Cronique de Lorraine added that "All the army promised to always obey her. Each victory motivated more loyalty and further victory. Even disobedience to her higher command seems to have invited loyalty; she brought action and victory, while the older, noble generals achieved nothing but inaction and defeat.

It should be unsurprising, then, that these viewpoints tended to extend to her trials—first the Condemnation trial in the hands of the English, and later the Rehabilitation trial under a commission appointed by Pope Calixtus III and organized by Charles VII. As Pinzino notes, "The pro-English (Burgundian) party into whose hands Joan fell in 1430, over a year after her role in the vital French victory at Orleans, worked to defame her self-asserted divine calling and executed her at age nineteen in the marketplace of Rouen in 1431. In the years following, however, political power in France permanently reverted to the pro-French (Armagnac) party of Joan's supporters. Promptly after Normandy and the city of Rouen itself had been restored to the French (1449) and the ecclesiastical archives there were retrieved and opened, the proceedings to nullify Joan of Arc's condemnation were undertaken by her supporters ... these proceedings were virtually unprecedented in ecclesiastical judicial history."

Unsurprisingly, the Condemnation trial found Joan's transvestism condemning. The primary cross-dressing charge, that Joan dressed entirely as a man "save Nature's own distinctive marks", was designed to evade Aquinas's exceptions on cross dressing—as Raoul Le Sauvage phrased it, to "escape violence and keep one's virginity", was predicated on total disguise and passing. Joan never attempted to "pass", but simply wore the attire of men, thus giving the English cause to condemn her for the act.

Charles VII, who owed his crown to Joan and had followed her, believing her to be divinely inspired, found himself now having been brought to power by a convicted heretic. On February 15, 1450, Charles dispatched a letter ordering the creation of a Royal Commission to reexamine the Condemnation trial, under the leadership of Guillaume d'Estouteville, Charles's cousin. As Pernoud and Clin note, "That trial was now a symbol of complex cultural fissures in search of closure: of the internal fractures of a riven France, of national splits enervated by English invasion, and of religious and civil power struggles sustained by the University of Paris." The rehabilitation trial focused strongly on the transvestism charge, which Pope Pius II noted was problematic. Individuals testifying during the trial stressed the necessity of her dress, both for means of keeping order in her troops in battle and for protecting her chastity. As the trial noted, she wore "long, conjoined hosen, attached to the aforesaid doublet with twenty cords (aiguillettes)" and "tight leggings". Guillaume Manchon testified, "And she was then dressed in male clothing, and was complaining that she could not give it up, fearing lest in the night her guards would inflict some act of outrage upon her," a claim backed up by a number of other witnesses. The same justification was given for her relapse by a number of witnesses, such as Friar Martin Ladvenu, Pierre Cusquel, Giullaume Manchon, and Friar Isambart de la Pierre, although a number of others, such as Jean Massieu, Pierre Daron, and Guillaume Colles, alternatively claimed that she was entrapped into wearing male clothing by a guard who took away her female clothing). Jean Moreau testified that he had heard Joan reply to the preacher that she had adopted male clothing during her campaign because she had to live among soldiers, among whom it was more appropriate for her to be in male, rather than female clothing. The court ruled that "nothing improper has been found in her, only good humility, chastity, piety, propriety, simplicity."

These viewpoints remained the dominant perspective on Joan's crossdressing up until the modern age. As Régine Pernoud notes in the foreword to Joan of Arc, serious books about her in any language "numbered only a few dozen". Likewise, the lack of modern acceptance of and knowledge about gender identity and sexuality further limited discourse on the subject.