Check out these infant apparel images:
Joan of Arc
Image by dbking
Joan of Arc on the upper park at Meridian Hill (Malcolm X) Park
Joan of Arc, or Jeanne d’Arc (1412–30 May 1431) is a national heroine of France and a saint of the Catholic Church. She stated that she had visions, which she believed came from God, and she used these to inspire Charles VII’s troops to retake most of his dynasty’s former territories which had been under English and Burgundian dominance during the Hundred Years’ War.
She had been sent to the siege of Orléans by the then-uncrowned King Charles VII as part of a relief mission. She gained prominence when she overcame the disregard of veteran commanders and ended the siege in only nine days. Several more swift victories led to Charles VII’s coronation at Reims and settled the disputed succession to the throne.
The renewed confidence of Charles VII’s forces outlasted Joan of Arc’s own brief career. She refused to leave the field when she was wounded during an attempt to recapture Paris that autumn. Hampered by court intrigues, she led only minor companies from then on, and fell prisoner during a skirmish near Compiègne the following spring. A politically motivated trial by the English convicted her of heresy. The English regent, John, Duke of Bedford, had her burnt at the stake in Rouen. She had become the leader of her faction at the age of seventeen, but died at the age of nineteen. Some twenty-four years later, Joan’s aged mother, Isabelle, convinced the Inquisitor-General and Pope Callixtus III to reopen Joan’s case, resulting in an appeal which overturned the original conviction by the English. Pope Benedict XV canonized her on 16 May 1920.
Joan of Arc has remained an important figure in Western culture. From Napoleon to the present, French politicians of all leanings have invoked her memory. Major writers and composers, including Shakespeare, Voltaire, Schiller, Verdi, Tchaikovsky, Twain, Shaw, and Brecht, have created works about her, and depictions of her continue to be prevalent in film, television, and song.
The period that preceded Joan of Arc’s career was one of the lowest points in French history. The prolonged war had produced much suffering among the population. Much of the northern portion of the kingdom was controlled by English troops, and there was a likely possibility that France would be joined with England as a "Dual Monarchy" under an English king. The French king at the time of Joan’s birth, Charles VI, suffered bouts of insanity and was often unable to rule. Two of the king’s relatives, Dukes John the Fearless of Burgundy and Louis of Orléans, quarreled over the regency of France and the guardianship of the royal children. The dispute escalated to accusations of an extramarital affair with Queen Isabeau of Bavaria and kidnappings of the royal children, and culminated when John the Fearless ordered the assassination of Louis in 1407. The factions loyal to these two men became known as the Armagnacs and the Burgundians. The English king, Henry V, took advantage of this turmoil and invaded France, won a dramatic victory at Agincourt in 1415, and proceeded to capture northern French towns. The future French king, Charles VII, assumed the title of dauphin as heir to the throne at the age of fourteen, after all four of his older brothers had died. His first significant official act was to conclude a peace treaty with John the Fearless in 1419. This ended in disaster when Armagnac partisans murdered John the Fearless during a meeting under Charles’s guarantee of protection. The new duke of Burgundy, Philip the Good, blamed Charles and entered an alliance with the English. Large sections of France fell to conquest.
In 1420, Queen Isabeau of Bavaria concluded the Treaty of Troyes, which granted the royal succession to Henry V and his heirs in preference to her son Charles. This agreement revived rumors about her supposed affair with the late duke of Orléans and raised fresh suspicions that the dauphin was a royal bastard rather than the son of the king. Henry V and Charles VI died within two months of each other in 1422, leaving an infant, Henry VI of England, the nominal monarch of both kingdoms. Henry V’s brother John of Lancaster, the duke of Bedford, acted as regent.
By 1429, nearly all of northern France, and some parts of the southwest, were under foreign control. The English ruled Paris and the Burgundians ruled Reims. The latter city was important as the traditional site of French coronations and consecrations, especially since neither claimant to the throne of France had been crowned. The English had laid siege to Orléans, a city situated at a strategic location along the Loire River which made it the last major obstacle to an assault on the remaining French heartland. In the words of one modern historian, "On the fate of Orléans hung that of the entire kingdom. No one was optimistic that the city could long withstand the siege.
Joan of Arc was born in the village of Domrémy in 1412 to Jacques d’Arc and Isabelle Romée. Her parents owned about 50 acres of land and her father supplemented his farming work with a minor position as a village official, collecting taxes and heading the town watch. They lived in an isolated patch of northeastern territory that remained loyal to the French crown despite being surrounded by Burgundian lands. Several raids occurred during Joan of Arc’s childhood, and on one occasion her village was burned.
Joan later testified that she experienced her first vision around 1424. She would report that St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret told her to drive out the English and bring the dauphin to Reims for his coronation. At the age of sixteen she asked a kinsman, Durand Lassois, to bring her to nearby Vaucouleurs, where she petitioned the garrison commander, Count Robert de Baudricourt, for permission to visit the royal French court at Chinon. Baudricourt’s sarcastic response did not deter her. She returned the following January and gained support from two men of standing: Jean de Metz and Bertrand de Poulegny. Under their auspices she gained a second interview, where she made an apparently miraculous prediction about a military reversal near Orléans.
She preferred to carry her standard into battle. Witnesses also reported her holding a sword, lance, or axe.Baudricourt granted her an escort to visit Chinon after news from the front confirmed her prediction. She made the journey through hostile Burgundian territory in male disguise. Upon arriving at the royal court, she impressed Charles VII during a private conference. He then ordered background inquiries and a theological examination at Poitiers to verify her morality. During this time, Charles’s mother-in-law, Yolande of Aragon, was financing a relief expedition to Orléans. Joan of Arc petitioned for permission to travel with the army and wear the equipment of a knight. Because she had no funds of her own, she depended on donations for her armor, horse, sword, banner, and entourage. Historian Stephen W. Richey explains her rise as the only source of hope for a regime that was near collapse.
"After years of one humiliating defeat after another, both the military and civil leadership of France were demoralized and discredited. When the Dauphin Charles granted Joan’s urgent request to be equipped for war and placed at the head of his army, his decision must have been based in large part on the knowledge that every orthodox, every rational, option had been tried and had failed. Only a regime in the final straits of desperation would pay any heed to an illiterate farm girl who claimed that voices from God were instructing her to take charge of her country’s army and lead it to victory.
Joan of Arc arrived at the siege of Orléans on 29 April 1429, but Jean d’Orléans (aka Dunois), the acting head of the Orléans ducal family, initially excluded her from war councils and failed to inform her when the army engaged the enemy. She overcame this by disregarding the veteran commanders’ decisions, appealed to the town’s population, and rode out to each skirmish, where she placed herself at the extreme front line, carrying her banner. The extent of her actual military leadership is a subject of historical debate. The eyewitness accounts say that she often made intelligent suggestions in the field, but that her soldiers and commanders regarded her mainly as a divinely-inspired mystic whose victories were attributed to God. Traditional historians, such as Edouard Perroy, conclude that she was a standard bearer whose primary effect was on morale. This type of analysis usually relies on the condemnation trial testimony, where Joan of Arc stated that she preferred her standard to her sword. Recent scholarship that focuses on the rehabilitation trial testimony more often suggests that her fellow officers esteemed her as a skilled tactician and a successful strategist. Stephen W. Richey asserts that "She proceeded to lead the army in an astounding series of victories that reversed the tide of the war. In either case, historians agree that the army enjoyed remarkable success during her brief career.
Reims cathedral, traditional site of French coronations. The structure had additional spires prior to a 1481 fire.Joan of Arc defied the cautious strategy that had previously characterized French leadership, pursuing vigorous frontal assaults against outlying siege fortifications. After several of these outposts fell, the English abandoned other wooden structures and concentrated their remaining forces at the stone fortress that controlled the bridge, les Tourelles. On 7 May, the French assaulted the Tourelles. Contemporaries acknowledged Joan as the leader of the engagement, during which at one point she pulled an arrow from her own shoulder and returned, still wounded, to lead the final charge.
The sudden victory at Orléans led to many proposals for offensive action. The English expected an attempt to recapture Paris or an attack on Normandy; Dunois later said that this in fact had originally been the plan, until Joan convinced them to proceed instead to Reims. In the aftermath of the unexpected victory, she persuaded Charles VII to grant her co-command of the army with Duke John II of Alençon, and gained royal permission for her plan to recapture nearby bridges along the Loire as a prelude to an advance on Reims and a coronation. Hers was a bold proposal, because Reims was roughly twice as far away as Paris, and deep in enemy-held territory.
Joan of Arc changed the fortunes of King Charles VII. By the end of his reign, he had regained every English possession in France except for Calais and the Channel Islands. The army recovered Jargeau on 12 June, Meung-sur-Loire on 15 June, then Beaugency on 17 June. The duke of Alençon agreed to all of Joan of Arc’s decisions. Other commanders, including Jean d’Orléans, had been impressed with her performance at Orléans, and became strong supporters of her. Alençon credited Joan for saving his life at Jargeau, where she warned him of an imminent artillery attack. During the same battle, she withstood a blow from a stone to her helmet as she climbed a scaling ladder. An expected English relief force arrived in the area on 18 June, under the command of Sir John Fastolf. The battle at Patay might be compared to Agincourt in reverse: The French vanguard attacked before the English archers could finish defensive preparations. A rout ensued that decimated the main body of the English army and killed or captured most of its commanders. Fastolf escaped with a small band of soldiers and became the scapegoat for the English humiliation. The French suffered minimal losses.
The French army set out for Reims from Gien-sur-Loire on 29 June, and accepted the negotiated neutrality of the Burgundian-held city of Auxerre on 3 July. Every other town in their path returned to French allegiance without resistance. Troyes, the site of the treaty that had tried to disinherit Charles VII, capitulated after a nearly bloodless four-day siege. The army was in short supply of food by the time it reached Troyes. Edward Lucie-Smith cites this as an example alleging that Joan of Arc was more blessed than skilled: A wandering friar named Brother Richard had been preaching about the end of the world at Troyes, and had convinced local residents to plant beans, a crop with an early harvest. The hungry army arrived just as the beans ripened.
Reims opened its gates on 16 July. The coronation took place the following morning. Although Joan and the duke of Alençon urged a prompt march on Paris, the royal court pursued a negotiated truce with the duke of Burgundy. Duke Philip the Good broke the agreement, using it as a stalling tactic to reinforce the defense of Paris. The French army marched through towns near Paris during the interim and accepted more peaceful surrenders. The duke of Bedford headed an English force and confronted the French army in a standoff on 15 August. The French assault at Paris ensued on 8 September. Despite a crossbow bolt wound to the leg, Joan of Arc continued directing the troops until the day’s fighting ended. The following morning, she received a royal order to withdraw. Most historians blame French grand chamberlain Georges de la Trémoille for the political blunders that followed the coronation.
.After minor action at La-Charité-sur-Loire in November and December, Joan went to Lagny-sur-Marne the following March, then to Compiègne on May 23rd to defend against an English and Burgundian siege. A skirmish on 23 May 1430 led to her capture. When she ordered a retreat, she assumed the place of honor as the last to leave the field. Burgundians surrounded the rear guard.
It was customary for a war captive’s family to raise ransom money whenever the captor allowed a ransom, which the Burgundians did not allow in this case. Many historians condemn Charles VII for failing to do more to intervene. She attempted several escapes, on one occasion leaping from a seventy foot tower to the soft earth of a dry moat. The English government eventually obtained her from Duke Philip of Burgundy. Bishop Pierre Cauchon of Beauvais, an English partisan and member of the Council which oversaw the English occupation of northern France, assumed a prominent role in these negotiations and her later trial.
Joan’s trial for heresy was politically motivated. The duke of Bedford claimed the throne of France for his nephew Henry VI. She was responsible for the rival coronation. Condemning her was an attempt to discredit her king. Legal proceedings commenced on 9 January 1431 at Rouen, the seat of the English occupation government. The procedure was irregular on a number of points.
To summarize some major problems, the jurisdiction of judge Bishop Cauchon was a legal fiction. He owed his appointment to his partisanship. The English government financed the entire trial. Clerical notary Nicolas Bailly, commissioned to collect testimony against her, could find no adverse evidence. Without this, the court lacked grounds to initiate a trial. Opening one anyway, it denied her right to a legal advisor.
The trial record demonstrates her exceptional intellect. The transcript’s most famous exchange is an exercise in subtlety. "Asked if she knew she was in God’s grace, she answered: ‘If I am not, may God put me there; and if I am, may God so keep me. The question is a scholarly trap. Church doctrine held that no one could be certain of being in God’s grace. If she had answered yes, then she would have convicted herself of heresy. If she had answered no, then she would have confessed her own guilt. Notary Boisguillaume would later testify that at the moment the court heard this reply, "Those who were interrogating her were stupefied" and abruptly halted the questioning for that day. This exchange would become famous, and is incorporated into many modern works on the subject.
Several court functionaries later testified that significant portions of the transcript were altered in her disfavor. Many clerics served under compulsion, including the inquisitor, Jean LeMaitre, and a few even received death threats from the English. Under Inquisitorial guidelines, Joan should have been confined to an ecclesiastical prison under the supervision of female guards (i.e., nuns). Instead, the English kept her in a secular prison guarded by their own soldiers. Bishop Cauchon denied Joan’s appeals to the Council of Basel and the Pope, which should have stopped his proceeding.
The twelve articles of accusation that summarize the court’s finding contradict the already-doctored court record. Illiterate Joan signed an abjuration document she did not understand under threat of immediate execution. The court substituted a different abjuration in the official record.
Heresy was a capital crime only for a repeat offense. Joan agreed to wear women’s clothes when she abjured. A few days later, according to eyewitnesses, she was subjected to an attempted rape in prison by an English lord. She resumed male attire either as a defense against molestation or, in the testimony of Jean Massieu, because her dress had been stolen and she was left with nothing else to wear.
Eyewitnesses described the scene of the execution on 30 May 1431. Tied to a tall pillar, she asked two of the clergy, Martin Ladvenu and Isambart de la Pierre, to hold a crucifix before her. She repeatedly called out "in a loud voice the holy name of Jesus, and implored and invoked without ceasing the aid of the saints of Paradise." After she expired, the English raked back the coals to expose her charred body so that no one could claim she had escaped alive, then burned the body twice more to reduce it to ashes and prevent any collection of relics. They cast her remains into the Seine. The executioner, Geoffroy Therage, later stated that he "…greatly feared to be damned for he had burned a holy woman.
A posthumous retrial opened as the war ended. Pope Callixtus III authorized this proceeding, now known as the "rehabilitation trial", at the request of Inquisitor-General Jean Brehal and Joan of Arc’s mother Isabelle Romée. Investigations started with an inquest by clergyman Guillaume Bouille. Brehal conducted an investigation in 1452. A formal appeal followed in November 1455. The appellate process included clergy from throughout Europe and observed standard court procedure. A panel of theologians analyzed testimony from 115 witnesses. Brehal drew up his final summary in June 1456, which describes Joan as a martyr and implicates the late Pierre Cauchon with heresy for having convicted an innocent woman in pursuit of a secular vendetta. The court declared her innocence on 7 July 1456.
Joan of Arc often wore men’s clothing between her departure from Vaucouleurs and her abjuration at Rouen. This raised theological questions in her own era and raised other questions in the twentieth century. The technical reason for her execution was a Biblical clothing law, but the rehabilitation trial reversed the conviction in part because the condemnation proceeding had failed to consider the doctrinal exceptions to that stricture.
Doctrinally speaking, she was safe to disguise herself as a page during a journey through enemy territory and she was safe to wear armor during battle. The Chronique de la Pucelle states that it deterred molestation while she was camped in the field. Clergy who testified at her rehabilitation trial affirmed that she continued to wear male clothing in prison to deter molestation and rape. Preservation of chastity was another justifiable reason for crossdressing: her apparel would have slowed an assailant. She referred the court to the Poitiers inquiry when questioned on the matter during her condemnation trial. The Poitiers record no longer survives but circumstances indicate the Poitiers clerics approved her practice. In other words, she had a mission to do a man’s work so it was fitting that she dress the part. She also kept her hair cut short through her military campaigns and while in prison. Her supporters, such as the theologian Jean Gerson, defended her hairstyle, as did Inquisitor Brehal during the Rehabilitation trial.
According to Francoise Meltzer, "The depictions of Joan of Arc tell us about the assumptions and gender prejudices of each succeeding era, but they tell us nothing about Joan’s looks in themselves. They can be read, then, as a semiology of gender: how each succeeding culture imagines the figure whose charismatic courage, combined with the blurring of gender roles, makes her difficult to depict.
The neutrality of the following section is disputed.
Joan of Arc’s religious visions have been one of the most heavily analyzed and controversial aspects of her life, attracting interest from theologians and psychologists alike. Whether Joan of Arc herself believed that her visions were from God is rarely disputed; based on her martyrdom and other biographical details, her religious faith is widely judged to have been sincere. She identified St. Margaret, St. Catherine, and St. Michael as the source of her revelations, although, as several saints have been canonized under each of these names, there is some ambiguity as to which of the identically-named saints she was referring to. Devout Roman Catholics regard her visions as divinely inspired. Those who suggest medical or psychiatric explanations for Joan of Arc’s visions typically posit hallucinations, mental illness, or self-delusion. Most scholars who propose such explanations for the visions, such as paranoid schizophrenia, consider Joan a figurehead more than an active leader. Among other hypothesized conditions are a handful of neurological conditions that can cause complex hallucinations, such as temporal lobe epilepsy. Ralph Hoffman, professor of psychology at Yale University, states that "hearing voices is not necessarily a sign of mental illness," and names Joan of Arc’s religious inspiration as a possible exception without speculation as to alternative causes.
Psychiatric explanations have encountered some objections. One is the slim likelihood that a mentally ill person could gain favor in the court of Charles VII. This king’s own father, Charles VI of France, had been popularly known as "Charles the Mad", and much of the political and military decline that had occurred in France during the previous decades could be attributed to the power vacuum that his episodes of insanity had produced. The old king had believed he was made of glass, a delusion no courtier had mistaken for a religious awakening. Fears that Charles VII would manifest the same insanity may have factored into the attempt to disinherit him at Troyes. As royal counselor, Jacques Gélu cautioned upon Joan of Arc’s arrival at Chinon, "One should not lightly alter any policy because of conversation with a girl, a peasant… so susceptible to illusions; one should not make oneself ridiculous in the sight of foreign nations…." Contrary to modern stereotypes about the Middle Ages, this particular royal court was shrewd and skeptical on the subject of mental health.
I t has also been argued that reports of Joan of Arc’s intelligence conflict with the possibility of mental illness. Joan of Arc remained astute to the end of her life, and rehabilitation trial testimony frequently marvels at her intelligence. "Often they [the judges] turned from one question to another, changing about, but, notwithstanding this, she answered prudently, and evinced a wonderful memory. Her subtle replies under interrogation even forced the court to stop holding public sessions. However, although intellectual decline and chronic memory loss are listed among the potential prodromes of several major mental illnesses, the apparent lack of these two symptoms does not, by itself, rule out the possibility of mental illness. It does, however, represent a lack of some of the identifiable symptoms that modern medical diagnostic manuals consider necessary for a positive diagnosis. Some scholars, such as Judy Grundy, have likewise pointed out that, based on the eyewitness accounts, other potential outward symptoms of such disorders, such as marked changes in personality and confused speech, were also absent in Joan’s case. Those who argue the opposite position consider the visions themselves to be proof of mental illness, usually based on one or more of the following propositions: 1) it is assumed that God would not order someone to wage war, or at least would not promote warfare against the English, therefore Joan must have been subject to hallucinations rather than Divine communication. Since this is an unproven assumption about the nature of God, the medical community would not normally use it as the basis for a diagnosis of mental illness. 2) It is assumed that science rejects the existence of God, therefore any such visions must be hallucinations, therefore she was mentally ill. This view also has its critics: since 40% of modern scientists say they do believe in God’s existence, the scientific community would seem to be divided on that issue. Additionally, the medical community does not automatically consider all mystics to be mentally ill, and generally does not consider the above type of argument to be valid grounds for a diagnosis: since the issue of possible mental illness in Joan of Arc’s case concerns the question of whether her visions were hallucinations, if one wishes to include these visions themselves as two symptoms of mental illness (i.e., "hallucinations" and "delusions"), then one would need to prove that these were in fact hallucinations and delusions rather than merely assuming them to be such and then using that assumption as evidence proving the assumption itself. To qualify as a valid diagnosis, evidence would need to be provided to support the proposition.
The only detailed source of information about Joan of Arc’s visions is the condemnation trial transcript, a complex and problematic document in which she resisted the court’s inquiries and refused to swear the customary oath on the subject of her revelations. Régine Pernoud, a prominent historian, was sometimes sarcastic about speculative medical interpretations: in response to one such theory alleging that Joan of Arc suffered from bovine tuberculosis as a result of drinking unpasteurized milk, Pernoud wrote that if drinking unpasteurized milk can produce such potential benefits for the nation, then the French government should stop mandating the pasteurization of milk.
The Prayer to St. Joan of Arc for Strength:
In the face of your enemies, in the face of harassment, ridicule, and doubt, you held firm in your faith. Even in your abandonment, alone and without friends, you held firm in your faith. Even as you faced your own mortality, you held firm in your faith. I pray that I may be as bold in my beliefs as you, St. Joan. I ask that you ride alongside me in my own battles. Help me be mindful that what is worthwhile can be won when I persist. Help me hold firm in my faith. Help me believe in my ability to act well and wisely. Amen.
Joan of Arc became a semi-legendary figure for the next four centuries. The main sources of information about her were chronicles. Five original manuscripts of her condemnation trial surfaced in old archives during the nineteenth century. Soon historians also located the complete records of her rehabilitation trial, which contained sworn testimony from 115 witnesses, and the original French notes for the Latin condemnation trial transcript. Various contemporary letters also emerged, three of which carry the signature "Jehanne" in the unsteady hand of a person learning to write. This unusual wealth of primary source material is one reason DeVries declares, "No person of the Middle Ages, male or female, has been the subject of more study than Joan of Arc.
"The people who came after her in the five centuries since her death tried to make everything of her: demonic fanatic, spiritual mystic, naive and tragically ill-used tool of the powerful, creator and icon of modern popular nationalism, adored saint. She insisted, even when threatened with torture and faced with death by fire, that she was guided by voices from God. Voices or no voices, her achievements leave anyone who knows her story shaking his head in amazed wonder.
In 1452, during the postwar investigation into her execution, the Church declared that a religious play in her honor at Orléans would qualify as a pilgrimage meriting an indulgence. Joan of Arc became a symbol of the Catholic League during the 16th century. Félix Dupanloup, bishop of Orléans from 1849 to 1878, led the effort for Joan’s eventual beatification in 1909. Her canonization followed on 16 May 1920. Her feast day is 30 May. She has become one of the most popular saints of the Roman Catholic Church.
The French Resistance used the cross of Lorraine as a symbolic reference to Joan of Arc.Joan of Arc has been a political symbol in France since the time of Napoleon. Liberals emphasized her humble origins. Early conservatives stressed her support of the monarchy. Later conservatives recalled her nationalism. During World War II, both the Vichy Regime and the French Resistance used her image: Vichy propaganda remembered her campaign against the English with posters that showed British warplanes bombing Rouen and the ominous caption: "They Always Return to the Scene of Their Crimes." The resistance emphasized her fight against foreign occupation and her origins in the province of Lorraine, which had fallen under Nazi control.
Traditional Catholics, especially in France, also use her as a symbol of inspiration, often comparing the 1988 excommunication of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre (founder of the Society of St. Pius X and a dissident against the Vatican II reforms) to Joan of Arc’s excommunication. Three separate vessels of the French Navy have been named after Joan of Arc, including a helicopter carrier currently in active service. At present the controversial French political party Front National holds rallies at her statues, reproduces her likeness in party publications, and uses a tricolor flame partly symbolic of her martyrdom as its emblem. This party’s opponents sometimes satirize its appropriation of her image. The French civic holiday in her honor is the second Sunday of May.
Holy Cross Abbey Sligo (St Dominic?)
Image by Fergal OP
This stone carving is a 13th century friar and the halo is actually more likely to be his capuce. There are no identifying features but the liklihood is that it represents Saint Dominic.
Centuries of exposre have weathered away the features – I would imagine that the stonework was richly painted at one stage. Clearly there is no remnant of the paint after almost 800 years – it’s highly unlikely that the Normans (who wore highly decorative clothes) had such plain art as some people believe.
______________________
In a valley of Old Castile, watered by the Douro, and about equidistant from Aranda and Osma, stands a simple village, called in the language of the country Calarnéga, and Caleroga in the softer language of many historians. There was St. Dominic born, in the 1170 of the Christian era. After God, he owed his existence to Felix de Gusman and Jeanne d’Aza. At Calarnéga this pious and noble pair possessed a residence, in which the Saint first saw the light, and part of which building is still in existence.
In 1266 Alphonso the Wise, king of Castile, in concert with his wife, sons, and leading grandees of Spain, founded a convent of Dominican nuns on the same spot. In this edifice are to be seen the apartments of more ancient date, differing in style from the rest of more ancient date, and differing in style from the rest of the building: a mediæval tower, bearing the arms of the Gusmans, a fountain named after them, and many other vestiges, designated in the traditional language of the neighborhood the Palace of the Gusmans. The chief seat of the Castilian branch of this noble house was a few miles distant; their place of sepulture, also near Calarnéga, was in the Cistercian church at Gumiel d’Izan. Thither were borne, after death, Felix de Gosman and Jeanne d’Aza, and they were interred in adjoining crypts. But the veneration in which they were held became ere long the cause of their separation. About the year 1318, John Emanuel, Infanta of Spain, caused the body of Jeanne d’Aza to be removed to the Dominican Convent erected by him at Pennafied. Felix remained alone in his ancestral tomb, a faithful witness to the illustrious blood inherited by St. Dominic, and Jeanne rejoined the spiritual family of her son, that she might share in the glory he had acquired by preferring a heavenly to an earthly posterity.
A wonderful sign heralded the birth of St. Dominic. His mother dreamt that she saw her child appear under the form of a dog, holding in its jaws a lighted torch, with which he kindled the whole world. Alarmed by the obscure presage, she frequently went to pray at the tomb of St. Dominic of Silos, formerly abbot of a monastery of the same name, not far from Calarnéga, and, in gratitude for the consolation vouchsafed her there, she bestowed the name of Dominic on the infant who had been the subject of so many prayers. He was the third child of this holy woman. The eldest, Antonio, dedicated his life to the service of the poor, and by his great charity adorned the priestly office to which he had been raised; the second, Mannès, died in the habit of the Order of Friar Preachers.
When Dominic was presented at the baptismal font, a new sign manifested his future greatness. His godmother, mentioned by historians merely as a lady of noble birth, beheld in a dream a radiant star on the brow of the newly baptized, the brilliancy of which seemed to remain on Dominic’s countenance; and it was remarked, as a singular fact, that a constant radiancy illumined his brow, attracting the hearts of all beholders. The white marble font in which he had been baptized, was transported to the monastery of Friar Preachers at Valladolid in 1605, by command of Philip III., who desired that his son should be baptized therein. At the present day it is at St. Dominic’s in Madrid, and many Spanish infants have there been initiated into the life that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
No stranger’s milk nourished St. Dominic; his mother would allow no blood but her own to circulate in his veins; at her breast he drank in his chaste nourishment, and from her lips he received the words of truth. In this maternal intercourse there was naught to fear, save the softness of his apparel, and those tender attentions which even the most Christian mother sometimes lavishes too freely on her child. But indwelling grace made him speedily revolt from any such yoke. As soon as he could move without assistance, he secretly left his cradle and took his rest upon the floor, as if he were already conscious of the misery of mankind, the difference of their lot her below, and was so moved with love for them that he could not endure that his couch should be better than theirs, or that, initiated in the secrets of Bethlehem, he desired a cradle like that of his Lord. We know nothing more of the first six years of his life.
Early in his seventh year he quitted the paternal roof, and was sent to his uncle, Gumiel d’Izan, arch-presbyter of the church in that place. There, near the tomb of his ancestors, and under the two-fold influence of authority and relationship, Dominic passed the second portion of his childhood. An historian remarks: “Ere the world had breathed on this child, he was entrusted, like Samuel, to the teaching of the Church, that he might benefit by her salutary discipline; and the result was, that, grounded on this firm foundation, he grew in stature and wisdom, daily advancing in the paths of virtue.”
The University of Palencia, in the kingdom of Leon, the only one Spain then possessed, was the third school in which Dominic was trained. He went their at the age of fifteen, and for the first time in life found himself alone, far from the happy valley where, beneath the walls of Calarnéga and Gumiel d”Izan, he had bidden adieu to the happy memories of home.
He remained at Palencia ten years, of which he devoted the first six to the study of literature and philosophy, as they were then taught. “But,” says another historian, “the angelic youth, although easily mastering all human science, was not enchanted with it, because he found not there the Wisdom of God, which is Christ. No philosopher has ever revealed this wisdom to man; none of the princes of this world have known it; therefore, lest he should consume the flower and strength of youth in fruitless labors, and that he might quench his ardent thirst, he turned to the deep wells of theology, invoking and praying Christ, the Wisdom of the Father, the he would open his heart to the true science, his ears to the teaching of Holy Scripture. So sweet was this Divine Word to him, with such avidity and desire did he receive it, that he passed his nights almost without sleep, giving to study the time he took from rest, and that he might drink the more worthily and with chaster lips from the fount of wisdom, he abstained for nearly ten years from the use of wine. It was a wondrous and pleasant sight to behold this man, with the outward marks of extreme youth, but with the mature conversation and strength of character belonging to advanced years. Superior to the pleasures of youth, he sought but for righteousness, and anxious to lose no time in aimless studies, he turned to his mother the Church, preferring the breasts of her consolation and repose of her tabernacles, and passing his time in diligent work and prayer.
God rewarded him for the fervent love with which he kept the commandments, by inspiring him with a sprit of wisdom and intelligence which rendered the more difficult questions easy for him to solve.
Of his sojourn in Palencia two traits remain. During a famine that ravaged Spain, Dominic, not content with giving to the poor all that he possessed, even he very garments, sold the books annotated by his own pen, so that he might give away the money he received for them; and when surprise was manifested at his depriving himself of the means of study, he uttered these words, the first that have been handed down to us” “How can I study from dry parchments when there are human beings dying of hunger?” Incited by his example, the University professors and students generously came to the relief of the unfortunate ones. Another time, seeing a woman, whose brother had been taken prisoner by the Moors, weeping bitterly at her inability to provide his ransom, Dominic offered to sell himself in order to redeem the captive; but God, having reserved him for the spiritual redemption of a great multitude of human beings, did not permit him to carry his purpose into effect.
When at the close of autumn, the traveler passes through a country cleared of all its harvests, he at times meets with some fruit that has escaped the hand of the laborer, and this remnant of past fertility suffices to enable him to judge of the unknown tracts through which he has passed. Thus Providence, while leaving in obscurity the youth of His servant Dominic, has nevertheless willed that history should preserve some traits, incomplete by touching revelations of a soul where purity, grace, intelligence, truth, and every virtue was the effect of a super abounding love to God and man. Dominic had almost attained his twenty-fifth year without any manifestation as yet of God’s will concerning him. To the man of the world life is but a short space, that he traverses in the slowest possible manner and by the most pleasant road. Not so does the Christian view it; he knows that each man, as vicar of Jesus Christ, must, by self-sacrifice, labor for the redemption of the human race, and that in the plan of this grand work each has his place assigned from eternity, – a place which he is free to accept or refuse. He knows that if he voluntarily desert the place Providence has offered him in the ranks of useful beings, that place will be given to a better than he, and he himself abandoned to his own self-guidance along the broad, short path of egotism. These thoughts occupy the mind of the Christian who as yet knows not to what he is predestined, and convinced that the surest way of learning it is to desire to accomplish it whatever it may be, he holds himself in readiness for all that God may will. He despises none of the offices necessary to the wellbeing of the Christian republic, because in all my be found the three things on which their real value depends – the will of God, who imposes them; the good resulting from the faithful exercise of the duties attendant thereon, and the fidelity of him to whom they are entrusted. He believes firmly that the least honored are not necessarily the least noble, and that the crown of the Saints never descends so swiftly from heaven as when destined to encircle the brow of the poor, – a brow grown hoary in lowly and humble service. Little cares he where God shall mark his place; it is sufficient for him to know what is the will of God. God had prepared for young Dominic an intermediary worthy of Himself, who would not only reveal to him his vocation, but open to him the gates of his future career, conducting him by unforeseen paths to the place of action where Providence was awaiting him.
Among the means of reform had recourse to by such as desired the re-establishment of ecclesiastical discipline was one specially recommended by the Sovereign Pontiff, to wit, the introduction of community life among the clergy. Thus had the Apostles lived; and St. Augustine, their copyist, has bequeathed to us the famous Rule that bears his name. Community life is neither more nor less than family life carried to its highest degree of perfection, and it is impossible for it to be faithfully practiced without those who have devoted themselves to it being inspired with those sentiments of fraternity, poverty, patience, and abnegation, in which the very soul of Christianity consists.
For about a century and a half they gave the name of canons-regular to priests leading this kind of life. They did not form one body under one head, but each house had its own prior, amenable only to the bishop. The one exception is the Order of Canons-regular of Prémontré, founded by St. Norbert in 1120. Now, the Bishop of Osma, Martin of Bazan, desirous of contributing to the restoration of discipline in the Church, had recently converted the canons of his cathedral into canons-regular, and learning that there was at the University of Palencia a young man of rare merit belonging to his diocese, he conceived the hope of attaching him to his chapter and interesting him in his plans of reform. He entrusted the negotiation of this matter to the person who had been his chief support in the arduous work he had just accomplished, a man illustrious by birth, genius, learning, and the venerable beauty of his life, and who later on united to these qualities, not peculiar to himself along, a title that none can dispute. For six centuries the Spaniard Don Diégo de Azévédo has reposed in a tome which I have not seen, and yet I never utter his name but with profound respect, for he was the intermediary chosen by God to enlighten and guide the Patriarch of a dynasty of which I am the child; and when I trace back the long chain of my spiritual ancestors, I behold him as the connecting link between St. Dominic and Christ.
History has preserved no record of the early conversations between Don Diégo and the youthful Gusman, but the results makes it easy to divine them. At twenty-five a generous soul seeks but to sacrifice itself, and, full of love and vigor, only demands of Heaven and earth a noble cause to serve. And if this be true of a soul indebted for its character to nature alone, how much more is it true of him in whose soul Christianity and natural disposition blend together as two pure streams, not one drop of whose waters have been lavished on vain passions! It is easy for me to picture Don Diégo and the noble student of Palencia. He learnt in few words what no book, no university, could teach: the existing struggle between good and evil in the world; the general tendency of things; and, in fine, all that constituted the inner secret of the age. Initiated into the evils of the time, by a man who understands them, Dominic doubtless felt the necessity of devoting himself soul and body to the cause of suffering Christendom. He saw at a glance his place and his work-saw them to be in the ranks of the priesthood according to Melchisedec; that he was to follow the steps of Jesus Christ, sole Savior of the world, sole Source of all truth, goodness, grace, peace, self-devotion, and whose enemies, take what name they may, are the eternal foes of the human race. He saw that this divine priesthood, defiled by many, unworthy of their consecration, needed to be re-exalted in the sight of God and man; and that this could only be effected by a revival of apostolic virtues in those who had been admitted to and honored with the priestly office. And as the first step in all reforms is to be oneself what on wishes others to be, the heir of the Gusmans dedicated his life to God in the reformed chapter of Osma, under the direction of don Diégo, prior at that time.
“Then,” says the Blessed Jourdain of Saxony, “he appeared among his brethren, the canons, as a shining light, foremost in sanctity, but in his own esteem lowest of all, shedding around him a life-giving odor, and a perfume, sweet as incense in summer-time. His brethren, admiring so lofty a piety, elected him sub-prior, in order that his exaltation might render his example more visible and more potent. He, like a flourishing olive-tree and growing cypress, remained day an night in the church, applying himself constantly to prayer, and scarcely ever quitting the cloister for fear of shortening his time for contemplation. God had given him a deep sorrow for sinners, for the afflicted and the miserable, whose woes Dominic enshrined in his inner sanctuary of compassion, and the deep loving sorrow he felt for them was so intense as to seek relief in tears. His almost constant habit was to pass the night in prayer and communion with God; and so great at times was his emotion, that from his closed chamber audible proofs of he same often proceeded. One thing he asked often and earnestly from God; it was that He would bestow on him a true charity, a love that would render it easy to give up all for the salvation of men, convinced that only then would he be a true member of Christ when he should consecrate himself with all his powers to win souls, after the example of the Savior of the world, the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our redemption. He was reading a book entitled Conferences of the Fathers, treating of vice and spiritual perfection, and in perusing it he strove to know and follow all the paths of righteousness. By God’s grace this book enabled him to attain to an unusual degree of purity of conscience, abundant light in meditation, and a very great perfection.”
Though Dominic’s life was to be but short, Providence was in no hurry, and allowed him to spend nine years at Osma in order to fit himself for the as yet unknown mission which he was destined to fulfill. In this interval, in the year 1201, Don Diégo Azévédo succeeded Martin de Bazan in the Episcopal see. Almost at the same time Dominic began his public preaching, but without going far from Osma; and probably continued this ministry, regarding which we have no particulars, until 1203, the solemn moment when, at the age of twenty-four, he quitted Spain and went forth all unconsciously to meet his destiny.
Here ends the training of St. Dominic, that is to say, the chain of events by which his mind and soul were fashioned, and which prepared him for the end which Providence intended for him to accomplish. Each man has a particular training, suited to his future work in the world, the knowledge of which is requisite to the full understanding of his character. Friendship opens up to us those deep recesses where the mysteries of the past and future are concealed’ confession also reveals the same, but in another intent; history too makes her search there, in order to seize events at their fountain-head and trace back their clue to Him who created the germ and enriched it with its countless forms of good. Called by God to be founder of a new Order that should edify the world by poverty, preaching, and heavenly wisdom, Dominic’s training was in conformity with this predestination. He is born of a noble family, because voluntary poverty is the more striking in one who renounces the rank and riches which are his by birth. He is born in Spain, far from the land which should be the scene of his apostolate, because one of the greatest sacrifices to an apostle is the quitting his native land in order to enlighten nations whose very language is unknown to him. The first ten years of his youth are spent at the University, that he may acquire the learning necessary for the evangelical office, and transmit it to, and cause it to be held in high esteem by, his Order. During the following nine years he conforms to the observances of community life, so that by thoroughly understanding its difficulties and its virtues, he may at a future day impose on his brethren no yoke but such as he himself had long borne. From his very cradle God endows him with an instinctive love of self-denial; for how shall the Apostle endure the fatigue of long journeys, heat, cold, hunger, imprisonment, blows, and misery, unless he early subjects his body to the rudest trials? God also gives him and early and ardent love of prayer; for prayer is the omnipotent act which places heaven’s might at man’s disposal. Heaven is inaccessible to violence; prayer brings Heaven down to us. But, over and above all, Dominic receives the gift without which all other gifts are naught – the gift of charity, so great that it impels him day and night to devote himself to the salvation of his brethren, whose afflictions move him even to tears. In fine, God sends him a man of marked strength of character, who becomes his friend and his bishop, and who, as we shall ere long see, will introduce him to France and to Rome. These few connected and important facts form a circle of thirty-four years, and, molded by their influence, Dominic attains, unblemished, the most perfect form of manhood to which the God-fearing man can aspire.
(Henri Lacordaire)
hitchin’ a ride
Image by nick see
my wife says he gets super happy when I ‘wear’ him like this. sometimes i wear him on the front…but i just got a haircut…and his hand-eye coordination is drastically improved as of late, so he just plays with my hair the whole time.
his entire little torso/head is not much bigger than my face. it’s ridiculous.
oh, little Gio’s just shy of 20 lbs, now. growing quick. eating everything we throw at him…and starting to get real grabby with anything that interests him.
