A MEDIEVAL DUEL TO THE DEATH.

A MEDIEVAL DUEL TO THE DEATH. I have just finished THE LAST DUEL: A TRUE STORY OF CRIME, SCANDAL, AND TRIAL BY COMBAT IN MEDIEVAL FRANCE by Eric Jager (same title as the book in the previous post, different subtitle) which is about trials by combat. Jager has a great story to tell and he tells it well, while sticking to the historical facts. He begins in Paris in 1386 with the scene of two combatants awaiting the battle in the closed arena from which only one will emerge alive and then tells the story of how they got there. The trial by combat is to determine the validity of a charge of rape. The woman who claims she was raped waits, dressed in black. If her husband is the one killed, she will be immediately burned at the stake because it will be God’s judgment that she has lied. Presumably to be sure that there is no outside interference with God’s judgment, both combatants have sworn an oath that they carry no magical charms on their persons. Trials by combat were solemn occasions. They took place in silence. The spectators were forbidden to make a sound, on pain of death. The monarchy had tried to eliminate trial by combat. It had been unable to do so, but the right to trial had been restricted to only the highest social classes and only after the fulfillment of elaborate procedural requirements. Before the new rules, trial by combat had been available to all, including peasants—women as well as men. In the next century, not in Paris, there was a duel fought by two burghers—with clubs.