As Joan of Arc was led from her cell to a waiting cart on the morning of 30 May 1431, she knew that she was travelling to her death. Trundling through Rouen’s cobbled streets, the wagon finally clattered to a stop at the market square, which was thronged with onlookers gathered around a hastily constructed platform and pyre – waiting to watch Joan burn.
The young woman was bundled onto the platform, dressed only in a thin shift. A cap shoved onto her shorn head denounced Joan as a “Relapsed heretic, apostate, idolater”. She trembled as her arms were pinned to a sturdy pole, then the pyre beneath her was set alight. As the flames licked higher, Joan stared intently at a crucifix held up by a priest in the crowd, repeating desperately and passionately one word: “Jesus. Jesus. Jesus.”