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The Last Duel: A True Story of Crime, Scandal, and Trial by Combat in Medieval France by Eric Jager Rating: ••• (Recommended)
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Engrossing UCLA Professor Eric Jager takes readers on a journey to medieval France on the pages of his new book, The Last Duel. This engrossing story presents the context and details of the last legally sanctioned duel, that of Jean de Carrouges and Jacques LeGris in December 1386. Jager takes us inside the medieval mind, and the complex relationships among lords and knights, husbands and wives, land and loyalty. Here’s an excerpt from Chapter 5, “The Challenge,” pp. 80-84: In the late winter or early spring of 1386 Jean de Carrouges set off to Paris for the second time that year, very likely after he and Marguerite had returned home. By now Marguerite was two or three months pregnant, and if Jean left her behind again, planning to send for her later or to return for her himself, this time he left her well guarded—perhaps by a trusted relative such as her cousin Robert de Thibouville. The trip to Paris would become harder for the pregnant Marguerite as the year wore on, although as the roads dried out during the warmer months, she could travel more comfortably by carriage. The journey of about 150 miles from Carrouges to Paris took the knight the better part of a week on the road heading eastward through Sees, Verneuil, and Dreux—one of the great routes from Normandy to Paris along which traders traveled from town to town and cattle were driven to slaughter in the capital. The knight knew that his reception at the royal court would be influenced by many things: his past service to the king, his family connections, and the powerful web of friendships and personal alliances that shaped the politics of the court. To his credit, Jean’s family had long and loyally served the kings of France. Jean himself had recently fought for King Charles in Britain, as well as in many other campaigns over the years. Some twenty years earlier, in 1364, he had also helped the royal family raise part of King Jean’s ransom. But Jacques Le Gris, although of much humbler birth, was better connected at the royal court, being a squire in the king’s own service who had personally attended high councils of state in Paris. The wealthy squire enjoyed added status as the favorite of Count Pierre, a member of the royal family and a cousin to the king himself. The count’s recent letters to the king about the results of the tribunal, a clear bid for royal support, were another stroke against the knight. Then there was the problem of Marguerite. The royal court would certainly remember that Jean’s wife, the woman at the center of the quarrel, was the daughter of the notorious traitor Robert de Thibouyule. Sir Robert’s treachery had forever tainted the Thibouville family name. And with Jean’s marriage to Marguerite, just five years before, the taint had rubbed off on him as well. Finally, there was the fact that when Carrouges arrived in Paris to present his case to the king, he planned to make a bold and unusual appeal. Under French law, a nobleman appealing a case to the king had the right to challenge his opponent to a judicial duel, or trial by combat. The judicial duel, distinct from the duel of honor used to settle quarrels over perceived insults, was a formal legal procedure for determining which party had sworn a false oath. A combat’s outcome was widely believed to reveal the truth in accord with God’s will. Hence the duel was also known as the “judgment of God”—or judicium Dei. Trial by combat was an ancient custom in France, especially Normandy, and both Jean and Marguerite had ancestors who had served as pledges, or sworn seconds, in judicial duels. In the earlier Middle Ages people of all social classes could resort to judicial combat, and public duels took place among peasants and townfolk as well as nobles. In parts of Europe even women were allowed to fight duels against men. The duel was used to adjudicate a wide range of felonies as well as civil cases such as property disputes. In civil cases, the principals could hire proxies, or “champions,” to fight in their place. But in criminal cases, the two parties had to fight in person, since the penalty for losing was usually death, and champions could stand in only for women, the elderly, or the infirm. For centuries the duel was also a form of appeal, and a litigant dissatisfied with a verdict could challenge the witnesses who had sworn against him, offering to prove his claims in combat. Even the lords serving as judges in the local seigneurial courts had once risked being challenged to duels by their own aggrieved vassals. In the later Middle Ages, however, judicial duels became more rare. Popes denounced the duel as a tempting of God, a thing forbidden by Scripture. And kings frowned on trial by combat because it infringed on their judicial authority, which they were trying to wrest away from their powerful barons and consolidate around their own thrones. By 1200 the duel began disappearing from civil proceedings in France, while in criminal cases it was increasingly limited to males of the nobility. In 1258, Louis IX eliminated the duel from French civil law, substituting for it the enquête, a formal inquiry involving evidence and testimony. But this still left the duel in place as a last resort for a noble seeking to appeal his lord’s verdict in a criminal case. In 1296, King Philip 1V completely outlawed the duel in times of war, because judicial combats among his nobles sapped the realm of manpower needed for military defense. In 1303, Philip outlawed the duel in peacetime as well. But Philip’s nobles resented the abolition of their time-honored privilege, and three years later, in 1306, the king relented, restoring judicial combat as a form of appeal in certain criminal cases, including rape, but now only under the king’s direct jurisdiction. The 1306 decree was still in force eighty years later, when Jean de Carrouges went to Paris to appeal Count Pierre’s verdict, but by now judicial duels were extremely rare. Four strict conditions had to be met for a case to qualify for a duel. First, the crime had to be a capital one, such as murder, treason, or rape. Second, it had to be certain that the crime really occurred. Third, all other legal remedies had to be exhausted, with combat—”proof by one’s body”—the only means of conviction left. And fourth, the accused person had to be strongly suspected of the crime. Besides the legal restrictions, calling for a duel was a very risky strategy that would greatly raise the stakes for the knight. Jean de Carrouges would put his own life in peril, as well as his estate and his family’s reputation, and even the salvation of his soul, since he would have to swear a solemn oath damning himself should he be proved a liar by the combat’s outcome. Jean would also place his wife in jeopardy, since Marguerite was the chief witness in the case. She would have to swear her own oath about her charges against Jacques Le Gris, and if Jean lost the duel as Marguerite’s champion, she, too, would be proved a liar. Since ancient times, false accusations were severely punished. If a judicial duel proved that a woman had perjured herself by swearing falsely about a rape charge, she would be put to death. But despite the long odds against obtaining a trial by combat, and the grave risks of fighting one, Jean de Carrouges may have felt by this point that only a duel to the death would enable him to avenge the terrible crime against his wife, to prove his charges against Jacques Le Gris, and to vindicate the couple’s honor. Perhaps he believed that God would favor him and that he could not fail in battle. Whatever the knights believed, as he made his way toward Paris along the rutted roads of Normandy, he was riding toward what would prove to be the most perilous adventure of his life. There are times when this engrossing book places more emphasis on the gross than squeamish readers would desire. Describing gory details of a battle to the death involves some gross parts. The Last Duel describes time, place and event with realistic detail that makes that era come alive. Steve Hopkins, November 26, 2004
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