Arc, Joan of, a celebrated heroine, otherwise called the Maid of Orleans, was born at Domremy, on the borders of Lorraine, January 6, 1412. She was the daughter of humble peasants and, in her earlier years, is said to have tended horses and rendered other menial services as the servant at a small inn. In her eighteenth year, however, professing to have a divine mission to be the savior of her country, she got herself introduced to the Dauphin Charles, headed his troops, and infusing courage into his dispirited adherents, restored his fallen fortunes in a most incredibly short period, and secured to him the crown of France. Eventually she fell into the hands of the Burgundians, and having been delivered over by them to the English and their French partisans, the latter caused her to be condemned to the flames as a heretic and sorceress in 1431.

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