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law courts could resume their activities and notable scoundrels were punished.
‘The count of Armagnac wanted the service of Mérigot Marchés on his planned crusade,
1390, not only to rid the Auvergne of an appalling freebooter, but also because “in all deeds
of arms he knew Marchés to be skilled and subtle in taking by assault of towns and able to
advise in all matters of war that one might need”. 11
Yet only a year later this routier was tried for treason by royal judges after he fell into
French hands. Marchés protested he was in English service, had three times been ransomed
by them, and that he had: ‘done all those things which a man can and ought to do in a just
war, as taking Frenchmen and putting them to ransom, living on the country and despoiling
it, and leading the company under his command about the realm of France, and burning and
firing places in it.’ 12
Despite this defence he was found guilty and publicly decapitated in Les Halles.
So, in some ways, the situation was perhaps not very different from today, where we
await the prosecution of ‘war criminals’ from the former-Yugoslavian conflicts of the 1990s.
The concept of Just War I have not touched on for reasons of time and it might be a topic to
return to in the discussion following this session; but I hope that what I have said will help in
forming a wider understanding of how civilians fare in times of war. 13

Bibliography

Primary SourceS
Froissart’s Chronicles, translated and edited, J. Jolliffe, Penguin, 1977.
The Tree of Battles of Honoré Bonet (recte Bouvet), G.W. Coopland, Liverpool, 1949.
The Book of the Deeds of Arms and Chivalry, Christine de Pisan, ed. trans. C.C. & S. Willard, Penn
Press, Philadelphia, 1999
The Chronicle of Jean de Venette, trans. R. Birdsall, ed. R, Newhall (New York, 1953).

Secondary SourceS
Christie, N. & Yazigi, M., Noble Ideals and Bloody Realities, Brill 2006 (Volume 40 in History of
Warfare Series, General Editor, Kelly De Vries). See articles by:
Hay, David J., “Collateral Damage?” Civilian Casualties in the Early Ideologies of Chivalry and Cru-
sade’ pp. 3-25
De Vries, K., ‘Medieval Warfare and the Value of a Human Life’, pp. 26-55

11 Wright p. 53, citing Froissart,
12 Continuity and Change in Medieval and Early Modern Warfare’ held at the University of Reading, Great
Britain, 11-12 September 2007 to be published as: ‘In what circumstances was war legitimate and what was
permissible in its conduct?’, in European Warfare 1350-1750 eds. F. Tallett & D.J.B. Trim (Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, forthcoming, 2009).
13 The issue of Just War is explored in my presentation at a conference entitled: ‘Crossing the Divide: