JOAN OF ARC (c. 1412–1431) was a French visionary; also known as the Maid of Orléans. Joan, who called herself Jeanne La Pucelle, used her claims to mystical experience to influence the course of French history in the fifteenth century. Led by her visions, she inspired the French army to turn the tide of the Hundred Years' War. Born around 1412 in Domrémy-la-Pucelle, a village on the border between Lorraine and France, Joan was a peasant who, in her own words, did not "know A from B." As she grew up she heard the magical lore and local saints' legends of Lorraine and reports of continuing French defeats at the hands of the English.

At age thirteen Joan began to hear a voice from God instructing her to go to the dauphin Charles, the uncrowned Valois king. Believing that she was called to drive...