Jean II Le Maingre
Jean II Le Maingre | |
|---|---|
 Boucicaut praying to Saint Catherine from the Hours of Jean de Boucicaut | |
| Born | 28 August 1366 Tours |
| Died | 21 June 1421 (aged 54) Yorkshire |
Jean II Le Maingre (Old French: Jehan le Meingre), also known as Boucicaut (28 August 1366 – 21 June 1421), was a French knight and military leader. Renowned for his military skill and embodiment of chivalry, he was made a marshal of France.
Biography
He was the son of Jean I Le Maingre, also called Boucicaut and likewise a marshal of France. He became a page at the court of Charles V of France, and at the age of 12 he accompanied Louis II, Duke of Bourbon, in a campaign against Normandy. At age 16 he was knighted by Louis on the eve of the Battle of Roosebeke (27 November 1382). In 1383, he began the first of his journeys that would take up more than twenty years of his life.
In 1384, he undertook his first journey to Prussia, in order to assist the Teutonic Order in their war against the pagan Lithuanians, who would convert to Roman Catholicism in 1386. After some campaigns against the Moors in Spain, and against Toulouse in France he again accompanied the duke of Bourbon, this time to Spain, which had become a secondary battlefield of the Hundred Years' War. From there he travelled for two years through the Balkans, the Near East, and the Holy Land, in the company of his friend Renaud of Roye and later with Philip of Artois, Count of Eu. There, he and his companions composed the Livre des Cent Ballades, a poetical defense of the chaste knight the central figure of chivalry, which Johan Huizinga found a startling contrast with the facts of his military career.[1]
In 1390, while the Truce of Leulinghem had temporarily interrupted the war with England, Boucicaut and two other French knights set up the tournament of Saint-Inglevert, where he jousted, along with his two comrades, against redoubtable English knights, unhorsing three of his 18 opponents. The next year he travelled to Prussia for a third time. Because of his great service in the war against the heathens in Livonia and Prussia, he was named Marshal of France on 25 December 1391 by Charles VI at the cathedral of St. Martin in Tours.
In 1396, he took part in the joint French-
In 1401, because of his military accomplishments and his knowledge of the east, he was appointed French governor of
On his return, he was defeated by the Venetians at the Battle of Modon on 7 October 1403. After some struggles in the Mediterranean the Genoese freed themselves from French rule by 1409.
Boucicaut returned to France and became involved in the rivalry between
Notes
- ^ Huizinga, J. (1924) [1919]. The Waning of the Middle Ages. p. 69.
- ^ Huizinga 1924, p. 69.
- ^ Meyer Setton 1976, pp. 387–388.
References
- Anonymous, Le Livre des faits du bon messire Jehan le Maingre, dit Boucicaut. maréschal de France et gouverneur de Jennes
- Châtelet, Albert, L' âge d'or du manuscrit à peintures en France au temps de Charles VI et les heures du Maréchal Boucicaut, Dijon 2000.
- Lalande, Denis, Jean II le Meingre, dit Boucicaut: (1366–1421) - étude d'une biographie héroïque, Genève 1988.
- Meyer Setton, Kenneth (1976). The Papacy and the Levant, 1204-1571: The thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. American Philosophical Society. ISBN 9780871691149.
- Taylor, Craig (2019). A Virtuous Knight: Defending Marshal Boucicaut (Jean II Le Meingre, 1366–1421). Woodbridge: York Medieval Press. ISBN 978-1-903153-91-8.
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