11. A Powerful Warrior Saint
Manacled to her bed with chains, Joan of Arc was incessantly harassed by her inquisitors at all hours of day and night in an effort to break her will and spirit. She adamantly refused to confess to wrongdoing, and her accusers were unable to prove either heresy or witchcraft. In frustration, they turned their attention to how she had donned male attire on the field of battle. On grounds that such cross-dressing violated biblical injunctions, they convicted her. On May 30th, 1431, she was taken on a cart to her site of execution in Rouen, where the nineteen-year-old Maid of Orleans was burned to death.
Two decades later, a new Pope ordered an inquisitorial court to reexamine Joan of Arc’s trial. It debunked all the charges against her, cleared her posthumously, and declared her a martyr. In 1803, Napoleon Bonaparte made her a national symbol of France. Five centuries after her death, she was beatified in 1909, then canonized as a Saint in 1920. Today, Saint Joan of Arc is one of the patron saints of France, and the most famous female warrior of all time.