THE EPIC OF JOAN OF ARC THROUGH THE EYES OF A LAW HISTORIAN (ON THE NEW BOOK BY CLAUDE GAUVARD)

The article is devoted to the analysis of a monograph written by Claude Gauvard, professor emeritus at the Pantheon-I-Sorbonne University, a former student of Bernard Guenee and a recognized specialist in political history and the history of medieval law of the Western Europe. In her new work the researcher turned to the history of Joan of Arc, and despite the fact that in the last two decades the etudes johanniques have been experiencing a genuine flourishing and it is already difficult to fi nd a plot that would not receive coverage in historiography, Claude Gauvard chose a very special angle for this topic. The author of the article examines in detail the formulation of the problem proposed in the monograph - to study the history of the national French heroine from the point of view of the legal ideas of Europeans of the late Middle Ages; to show exactly which topics formed the basis of the reputation of Joan of Arc and of her subsequent perception by contemporaries; to reveal the purely legal aspects of the Maid's relations with her supporters and opponents, and above all, of the assessment of her activities during the indictment process of 1431 and the rehabilitation process of 1455-1456.