Festivities in Orleans as France fetes Joan of Arc’s birthday

On Tuesday, like in a Hollywood epic, the Loire River swarmed with wooden boats filled with locals dressed in medieval garb -- re-enacting Joan of Arc’s legendary entry into the city in 1429. It’s an event that liberated Orleans from English invaders, and sealed her place in the history books. It has inspired, over the centuries, myriad novels, poems, rock songs, operas, plays -- and even a blockbuster feature film with Milla Jovovich.

“It’s marvelous to see the children dressing up and learning about this great French heroine who’s known all over the world,” said Jacques Dubarre, dressed in a velvet mantel. “Of course we’re also having fun.”

In a testament to her international appeal, some 600 contemporary artists -- from as far as the US, Japan and Russia -- have made portraits of Joan of Arc through the ages that will be projected on the City Hall this Friday.

Later in the week, a medieval market will be the scene of period cuisine and music, while a sound and light show will be projected on the city’s Gothic cathedral to celebrate her life. Despite the enduring fame, it’s been a rocky ride for the teenage legend. At just 17 years old Joan led the French army to victory, only to be burnt at the stake as a heretic two years later.

She was heralded as a political symbol of the French far left during world war two, only to be snatched up as the mascot of the far right thirty years later. It seems like the only thing that anyone can agree on is that she is the ultimate French icon.

“The two most famous figures from France are Napoleon and Joan of Arc, no others quite come close,” said Russian journalist Vladimir Dobrovolsky, one of the estimated 40,000 festival goers. Though in France she is seen as a sort of symbol of the nation (“nation” being a feminine word in French), the myths around her began relatively late. It was in World War I that an effigy of Joan of Arc in armor, which appeared on pictures and postcards, first came to symbolize war and nationhood -- in this case, the French fight against Germany.