Joan of Arc, a well-known Catholic saint and French national heroine, is a figure worthy of historical attention. Born in Domrémy, France, around 1412, Jeanne lived as a peasant with her family on fifty acres of land. At the end of her short life of nineteen years, Joan revealed at a trial that her rise to power in the Anglo-French conflict was due to a series of visions she had had as a young girl. These visions, of a religious nature, helped Jeanne transform the Hundred Years' War into a religious conflict. Despite her efforts to turn the tide of the war and help win a crucial battle at Orléans, Joan was captured and tried for heresy. After a months-long trial, Joan was officially labeled a heretic and burned at the stake in 1431. It was not until centuries later that Joan was granted sainthood in the Catholic Church and officially recognized as a woman of power, even centuries later. his death. The life of Joan of Arc can be examined in three distinct parts: the revelations of religious visions from her childhood, her entry into the Hundred Years' War as leader of the French army, and her death as a heretic and his eventual entry into holiness. The combination of these events convinces observers that Joan was a woman of power ahead of her time and that at each stage of her life, Joan assumed a role normally expected of men. Joan of Arc was therefore a major catalyst for feminist action, serving as a visionary, a military hero, and ultimately a martyr. A look at the early life and visions of Joan of Arc is essential to understanding her childhood as a repressed woman and unlikely mystic. Author Mary Gordon, in her review of Joan, writes about an event that took place long before Joan's visions......middle of article......iking Penguin, 2000 . Introductory notes to the (rehabilitation) trial Cancellation. Transcript of the trial. DeSt. Joan of Arc Center. Sainte-Jeanne d'Arc Center. http://www.stjoan-center.com/Trials/null01.html (Accessed March 1, 2011) Joan of Arc. Letter to the King of England, 1429. Letter. From Internet MedievalSourcebook. Medieval Sourcebook.http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/joanofarc.html (accessed March 19, 2011)Kelly, H. Ansgar. “The right to remain silent: before and after Joan of Arc. » Speculum. 68:4 (1993): 992-1026. Nider, Johan. Johan Nider: on Joan of Arc. Newspaper. From Internet MedievalSourcebook. Medieval Sourcebook.http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/nider-stjoan1.html (accessed March 19, 2011)Wood, Charles T. Joan of Arc and Richard III: Sex, Saints, and Government in the Middle Ages . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988.