Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and Grimm and Mild from Aaronminkie. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 1: It was January of thirteen ninety three and the Queen
Speaker 1: of France, Queen Isabel, was throwing a ball. Ostensibly, the
Speaker 1: ball was to celebrate the third marriage of a twice
Speaker 1: widowed lady in waiting, but really the party's purpose was
Speaker 1: a little broader. The Queen's husband, King Charles the sixth,
Speaker 1: was often ill, prone to fits and bouts of insanity
Speaker 1: that would last months. Queen Isabeau liked to hold plenty
Speaker 1: of events at court to distract and entertain the King
Speaker 1: and hopefully keep him in his right mind. The main
Speaker 1: event of this ball would be a shivery featuring six
Speaker 1: senior nights. The knights would dress up in costumes as
Speaker 1: wild men from the forest and then delight the attendees
Speaker 1: at the party by dancing and howling and screaming in
Speaker 1: their faces, gesticulating at them, running around in a frenzy,
Speaker 1: and inviting the party guests to guess their identities. If
Speaker 1: you've never dressed as a wild man from the forest before,
Speaker 1: or if you're planning on doing it, next Halloween. The
Speaker 1: costumes involved covering the men from head to toe in
Speaker 1: linen soaked in pitch, and then sticking on enough flax
Speaker 1: so they looked terry and well wild. Their faces were
Speaker 1: also covered in masks made of the same linen soaked
Speaker 1: in pitch covered in dried flax. No one, not even
Speaker 1: the Queen, knew that one of the six mysterious dancing
Speaker 1: wild men was actually King Charles the sixth. The raucous
Speaker 1: celebration began, and women in the crowd screamed as the
Speaker 1: half dozen men leapt around them, and then late to
Speaker 1: the party came the Duke of Orleans, the King's brother.
Speaker 1: The Duke of Orleans was drunk and holding a torch.
Speaker 1: Part of the game of the chivery was guessing which
Speaker 1: nights were hidden beneath the layers of extremely flammable linen
Speaker 1: and pitch and dried flax, and so the Duke leaned
Speaker 1: in closer to get a better look. Maybe you see
Speaker 1: where this is going. The wild man burst into flames.
Speaker 1: As he flailed, he quickly ignited the other wild men
Speaker 1: around him. A young duchess only fourteen, recognized the king
Speaker 1: and managed to protect him from the sparks with her skirts.
Speaker 1: But for the rest of the men, it was a
Speaker 1: gruesome scene. The smell of burning pitch and then charred
Speaker 1: flesh filled the room. A cardinal wrote that he watched
Speaker 1: the burnt genitals of one of the men fall to
Speaker 1: the floor, releasing a stream of blood. One of the
Speaker 1: other nights was able to save himself by jumping into
Speaker 1: a barrel of wine, but aside from the King, the
Speaker 1: rest of the men perished from the flames. The evening
Speaker 1: would come to be known as the Bal de Sardin
Speaker 1: Ball of the Burning Men, it's a grisly chapter that
Speaker 1: unfortunately seems to represent the reign of Charles the sixth.
Speaker 1: His reign was an era of chaos and voices shouting
Speaker 1: over each other for control. As king, Charles would betrayaled
Speaker 1: by tragedy, by civil war, and foreign invasion, but his
Speaker 1: most pernicious enemy would be his own mind. For thirty years,
Speaker 1: the king would suffer alternating periods of lucidity and madness
Speaker 1: as his kingdom fell into disarray around him. The king
Speaker 1: would be as powerless as he was that night the
Speaker 1: Ball of the Burning Men, as he watched his friends
Speaker 1: fall and burn death at what should have been a party.
Speaker 1: I'm Dana Schwartz, and this is noble blood. Charles's father
Speaker 1: died when he was just eleven years old, a few
Speaker 1: weeks before his twelfth birthday. The age of majority for
Speaker 1: taking over a kingdom in the thirteen hundreds was fourteen,
Speaker 1: and so in the meantime in came Charles's uncle's The
Speaker 1: duties of the king them were divided up. Amongst them,
Speaker 1: his paternal uncles, the brothers of the former king, were
Speaker 1: the most important. They were the Duke of Anjou, the
Speaker 1: Duke of Burgundy, also known as Philip the Bold, and
Speaker 1: the Duke of Barry. Duke of Anjou became regent. Burgundy
Speaker 1: took over the royal household, and Barry was given the
Speaker 1: governorships of the regions of Langu, Duck and Aquitaine. Charles
Speaker 1: is one maternal uncle, the Duke of Bourbon, assisted with
Speaker 1: the royal household. As you can imagine, chaos ensued. Like
Speaker 1: evil uncles out of a fairy tale. The group of them,
Speaker 1: known as the Sires de flour de Lis, were selfish
Speaker 1: and avaricious, less interested in running the country and more
Speaker 1: interested in using their new found power to benefit themselves,
Speaker 1: undoing all of the good work that the dead King
Speaker 1: Charles five had done lowering taxes. In the meantime, the regent,
Speaker 1: the Duke of Anjou, first snatched whatever treasures he could
Speaker 1: from the dead king's private treasury. Then, to make more
Speaker 1: money for himself and also to fund the increasingly expensive
Speaker 1: Hundred Years War, he raised sales taxes and withheld payment
Speaker 1: from troops. The troops didn't take that very well. In retaliation,
Speaker 1: soldiers flocked to Paris in protest. To quote W. H.
Speaker 1: Jervis's A History of France, the furious and underpaid troops
Speaker 1: took to the streets to commit quote every kind of excess.
Speaker 1: More details about what those excesses are aren't given, so unfortunately,
Speaker 1: we'll have to use our imagination. Their outrage was directly
Speaker 1: against the regent, and they demanded that the Duke of
Speaker 1: Anjou lower the new taxes. Of course, faced with an
Speaker 1: angry mob of soldiers, the Duke conceded, but his concession
Speaker 1: was only temporary. There would be another tax on cloth
Speaker 1: and another right, this time in Rua. But this time
Speaker 1: the regent was ready to put the riot down with
Speaker 1: swift and immediate force. The leaders of the revolt were executed,
Speaker 1: and the duty on cloth continued. Now that he had
Speaker 1: tasted victory in subduing the masses, the Duke of Anjou
Speaker 1: would no longer concede or back down. He enacted a
Speaker 1: new tax in Paris, an exercise duty on the produce
Speaker 1: sold in markets. That led to another massive insurrection, in
Speaker 1: which people stormed government offices and released the prisoners at
Speaker 1: the Chatelai. But the group of protesters called the Melotines
Speaker 1: didn't have a natural leader, and so the fervor and
Speaker 1: energy of the riots eventually dissipated. Terms could be negotiated.
Speaker 1: The court declared that the tax would be abandoned and
Speaker 1: that there would be amnesty for the riders. For a moment,
Speaker 1: there was calm, until the court started with arrests and executions.
Speaker 1: Amnesty be damned. Finally, the city's advocate general arranged to
Speaker 1: pay the Duke of Anjou a hundred thousand francs if
Speaker 1: there would be no more retaliation for the protests. The
Speaker 1: Duke happily agreed. Almost immediately after this strategic and domestic disaster,
Speaker 1: the Duke of Anjou got word from his cousin Joanna
Speaker 1: of Naples that she was making him her successor, So
Speaker 1: as one does, he waved goodbye to France and bounded
Speaker 1: off with a small army to Naples, where he was
Speaker 1: all ready to beat out a competing heir to the throne.
Speaker 1: But before he did that, the Duke of Anjou died
Speaker 1: suddenly in Italy, one uncle down, but no matter, Philip,
Speaker 1: the Bold, Duke of Burgundy took over duties as regions.
Speaker 1: The Duke of Burgundy had married the heiress of Flanders.
Speaker 1: He used the power of France to control that region
Speaker 1: against insurrection with a brutal fist. The people of Ghent,
Speaker 1: who had been rebellious, were met with the full power
Speaker 1: of what Jervis calls quote rapacious and brutal aristocracy. Wanting
Speaker 1: another ally to defend Flanders, particularly against the threat from
Speaker 1: the English, the Duke of Burgundy arranged for his nephew,
Speaker 1: the King, to marry Isabeau of Bavaria. Charles the sixth
Speaker 1: was sixteen, Isabeau was a few years younger. You might
Speaker 1: recall that the age of majority in France was fourteen,
Speaker 1: and that by this point Charles was well past it.
Speaker 1: So why then did he keep letting his uncle's control
Speaker 1: the country's affairs. Well, we don't really know. Charles didn't
Speaker 1: seem that interested in being king. It seems as though
Speaker 1: he thought that his uncles were doing the hard parts
Speaker 1: of his job for him, and he was free to
Speaker 1: hunt and ride and drink with his friends. But soon
Speaker 1: his uncle's mounting military failures would leave Charles no choice
Speaker 1: but to finally accept his crown. First, there was a
Speaker 1: disastrously failed invasion of England. One fleet was hit by
Speaker 1: a devastating storm off the coast of Brittany, and then
Speaker 1: the Duke of Berry, having not supported the invasion in
Speaker 1: the first place, delayed until the tide and season meant
Speaker 1: it was too late to sail. England swept in, attacked
Speaker 1: and destroyed several friendships easily. But there was more that
Speaker 1: Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, wanted his nephew to do.
Speaker 1: They didn't call him the Bold for nothing. The Duke
Speaker 1: of Burgundy said that the king needed to mount an
Speaker 1: expedition against a man named Duke William Girous, who had
Speaker 1: somehow insulted Charles, Burgundy said, but who had absolutely insulted
Speaker 1: Burgundy's wife's aunt. In other words, it was a petty
Speaker 1: family squabble, and the Duke of Burgundy wanted to use
Speaker 1: the power of the King of France, and so young
Speaker 1: Charles mounted the expedition like his uncle asked. But in
Speaker 1: the end it led to nothing. Charles lost a number
Speaker 1: of troops and in the end, when he did win,
Speaker 1: all he asked for was for William of Gudrus to apologize,
Speaker 1: which he did. The Cardinal Bishop of Land spoke up
Speaker 1: at the next Council board meeting. By now the king
Speaker 1: was twenty one years old, it was time for him
Speaker 1: to terminate the regency and cut free his selfish, battle
Speaker 1: hungry uncles. Charles agreed. He told his uncle's he would
Speaker 1: be taking over, and with all of the grace and
Speaker 1: charm in the world, his uncle's respectfully conceded their power
Speaker 1: over to him. That very same day, Cardinal Bishop Land
Speaker 1: died of suspected poisoning, but that could just be, you know,
Speaker 1: complete coincidence. As official King Charles the Six reinstalled the
Speaker 1: incredibly competent and wonkish ministers that his father had used,
Speaker 1: a group both affectionately and mockingly called the Marmose the Marmosetts.
Speaker 1: Together they brought back the sensible tax policies and laws
Speaker 1: that had disappeared in the confusion and selfishness of the
Speaker 1: Four Way Regency. It's at this point that Charles gets
Speaker 1: his first nickname, Charles le bien Army Charles the Beloved.
Speaker 1: But it wouldn't last. Just a few years later, disaster
Speaker 1: and death would reach Charles and cling to him for
Speaker 1: the rest of his life. Into one of the King's
Speaker 1: closest advisers and allies, a man named Oliver de Clesson
Speaker 1: had an attack on his life by another gentleman named
Speaker 1: Pierre de Krome. Kraw was a young cousin of the
Speaker 1: Duke of Brittany, and recently he had been distanced from court.
Speaker 1: He blamed Oliver de Clisso for his change in fortunes,
Speaker 1: and so one evening, when Oliver de Clissen was walking home,
Speaker 1: Kraw and a few friends ambushed him in the street
Speaker 1: and left him for dead. Fortunately, Oliver de Clisson lived. Kraw,
Speaker 1: on the other hand, fled to the safety of his
Speaker 1: cousin in Brittany, who took him under his protective custody. Well,
Speaker 1: that would not stand for King Charles the Six. He
Speaker 1: needed justice for his friend, and so on July one,
Speaker 1: the king mounted an expedition towards Brittany. The summer was
Speaker 1: sweltering and the pace of the party traveling was excruciatingly slow.
Speaker 1: A few week into their journey, at the northwestern city
Speaker 1: of Lament, the king came down with an illness that
Speaker 1: kept him in bed for three weeks. The king's physicians
Speaker 1: wanted to keep him in bed for longer, but Charles refused.
Speaker 1: Even though he still had a fever. He mounted his
Speaker 1: horse and demanded that the party continue. That day was
Speaker 1: August five, and it was swelteringly hot. They rode for
Speaker 1: a few quiet hours while the sun basted down on
Speaker 1: them from directly overhead, and then a man appeared on
Speaker 1: the road. He sometimes described as a leper or a beggar,
Speaker 1: but either way, this man jumped in front of the
Speaker 1: horses and started waving his arms. Ride no further, noble King,
Speaker 1: He shouted, turned back, thou Art betrayed. He kept repeating
Speaker 1: that over and over again, thou Art betrayed, thou Art betrayed.
Speaker 1: The King's guards forced the man out of the road
Speaker 1: and shook him off, but the man wouldn't leave. He
Speaker 1: continued to walk behind the horses shouting up at the
Speaker 1: royal procession. Thou art betrayed. The man was mad, clearly
Speaker 1: the king ignored him. In fact, the king found that
Speaker 1: he could ignore most things. In the hot august heat,
Speaker 1: with the gentle, lulling stride of his horse beneath him,
Speaker 1: the king felt himself sinking into something of a stupor
Speaker 1: until a crash. A page had fallen asleep on his
Speaker 1: horse and dropped a lance, which struck a helmet with
Speaker 1: a loud bang. Charles the sixth went mad. He pulled
Speaker 1: his sword and started whipping it back and forth at
Speaker 1: his own men. You're all traders, he cried. The king
Speaker 1: stabbed at his knights and men, flailing wildly. By the
Speaker 1: time they were able to disarm the king, he had
Speaker 1: already murdered one of his own soldiers and wounded several others.
Speaker 1: After a few days, when the king came to and
Speaker 1: his fever broke, he was deeply regretful and ashamed of
Speaker 1: what he had done. He was haunted by it. His
Speaker 1: uncles would take over again, just for a bit, just
Speaker 1: until the king was well again, if he ever got
Speaker 1: well again, they said in private. Just a few years later,
Speaker 1: more of Charles's friends suffered grim accidental deaths at the
Speaker 1: ball of the burning Men. What was meant to be
Speaker 1: a lighthearted romp to lighten the king's spirits became a
Speaker 1: living nightmare. Of the four men who eventually died from
Speaker 1: their burns, only one died that evening. The other three
Speaker 1: died slow and painful deaths, with burns covering most of
Speaker 1: their bodies. For his part, the king's brother, the Duke
Speaker 1: of Orleans, felt horribly guilty for being the one who
Speaker 1: had held the initial torch. The people of France were
Speaker 1: outraged when word of the tragedy reached them. Was it
Speaker 1: attempted regicide? How had anyone allowed the king to be
Speaker 1: put in such a position of danger. In order to
Speaker 1: appease the public, the Duke of Orleans and several of
Speaker 1: the king's advisers embarked on a literal walk of shame,
Speaker 1: while the King rode on horseback beside them to the
Speaker 1: Notre Dame Cathedral to do public penance. The Duke of
Speaker 1: Orleans also paid for a chapel to be built at
Speaker 1: a nearby monastery. The people still loved their king, Charles
Speaker 1: the Beloved, but he would test that love for the
Speaker 1: rest of his reign, and eventually he would take on
Speaker 1: a new epithet, Charles Leafu or Charles the Mad. For
Speaker 1: three to five months, Charles would be completely lucid and sane,
Speaker 1: and then for anywhere from three to nine months, he
Speaker 1: would lose his tether to reality, forgetting his own name,
Speaker 1: forgetting he was king, unable to recognize any of his
Speaker 1: children or his wife Isabell. Once, when his wife came
Speaker 1: to his bed chamber hoping to um personally remind her
Speaker 1: husband of who she was, and exasperated, Charles just told
Speaker 1: his servants to take care of whatever it was that
Speaker 1: this woman seemed to want. He didn't realize why that
Speaker 1: was funny, when it wasn't indifference towards loved ones, it
Speaker 1: was outright animosity. The only family member he seemed able
Speaker 1: to recognize was his sister in law, the Duchess of Orleans.
Speaker 1: Jealous of her relative power over the king, the king's uncle,
Speaker 1: the Duke of Burgundy, remember him, took advantage of the
Speaker 1: era's superstitions and said that the Duchess had only made
Speaker 1: herself known to the king with sorcery. Burgundy had her
Speaker 1: banished from court. This tension between Burgundy and Orleans would
Speaker 1: become an important pattern in King Charles spent weeks claiming
Speaker 1: that he was Saint George. He ran around a lot
Speaker 1: of the time. His staff would have to wall off
Speaker 1: entrances to the King's residences so that he wouldn't get
Speaker 1: lost and they wouldn't lose track of him. In fourteen
Speaker 1: o five, Charles did bathe or change his clothes for
Speaker 1: five months. It was around this time that he saw
Speaker 1: for it from the glass delusion, the idea that he
Speaker 1: himself was made of glass and that he could shatter
Speaker 1: at any moment. He was obsessed with protecting himself from shattering,
Speaker 1: insisting on having iron rods sewn into his clothing so
Speaker 1: he could say straight and unharmed when he might be
Speaker 1: forced to interact with anyone, just as it had been
Speaker 1: during his childhood. Having no clear regent for the king
Speaker 1: meant that the kingdom fell into confusion and chaos, nearing
Speaker 1: anarchy as rival factions the Queen, the king's oldest son,
Speaker 1: the Daufin, the Duke of Burgundy, and the Duke of
Speaker 1: Orleans were all vying for power. After the Duke of
Speaker 1: Burgundy died in his sixties, his claim to power is
Speaker 1: taken up by his son, John the Fearless, the new
Speaker 1: Duke of Burgundy. In fourteen o seven, while the Queen
Speaker 1: was recovering from an illness, the Duke of Orleans visited
Speaker 1: her every day. At the end of November, the Duke
Speaker 1: received a message from the King saying that he needed
Speaker 1: him at the palace. Immediately, the Duke of Orleans left
Speaker 1: to go heed his brother's request, but the message was
Speaker 1: a fake, meant to lure him out onto the street,
Speaker 1: where he was attacked and killed. So who killed the
Speaker 1: King's brother, Well, John the Fearless, the new Duke of
Speaker 1: Burgundy didn't really deny that he did. In order to
Speaker 1: avenge his father's death, the new Duke of Orleans enlisted
Speaker 1: the support of his father in law, the Duke of Amagnac,
Speaker 1: and thus began the Amagnac Burgundian Civil War. All of
Speaker 1: this was happening at the same time as the ongoing
Speaker 1: hundred Deer War with England, and as a rule, you
Speaker 1: don't want to have a civil war at the same
Speaker 1: time you're also fighting off an external enemy. It gets
Speaker 1: a little complicated with the battles and rival factions, but
Speaker 1: the cliff notes version is that in all of the chaos,
Speaker 1: Henry the five of Kenneth Branas Shakespeare fame, swept into
Speaker 1: France and won the Battle of Agincourts. In fourteen fifteen,
Speaker 1: during a period of lucidity, Charles six signed the Treaty
Speaker 1: of Trois, which named Henry the fifth as charles successor
Speaker 1: and married Henry to one of Charles's daughters. In the
Speaker 1: Shakespeare version of the story, the treaty happened right after Agincore,
Speaker 1: but really these things are slow and undramatic. It was
Speaker 1: five years later. Charles the sixth is the unnamed French
Speaker 1: king in the Shakespeare play, but none of Charles's madness
Speaker 1: is referenced. Instead, if you've read Henry five, the French
Speaker 1: king is portrayed as just indecisive, dominated by the overbearing
Speaker 1: presence of his ministers and advisers. When Charles the six
Speaker 1: finally does die, it's met with whales in the streets.
Speaker 1: They cry for him in a way that they didn't
Speaker 1: at all for his uncle's or his brother. Even after
Speaker 1: thirty years of madness, he was still Charles the beloved.
Speaker 1: That's the story of Charles the six. But keep listening.
Speaker 1: After a brief sponsor break to hear, a little bit
Speaker 1: of what happened in France after his death, and a
Speaker 1: quick personal note. If you want to support the show,
Speaker 1: you can do so on Patreon at patreon dot com
Speaker 1: slash Noble Blood Tales, where I'll be posting episode scripts
Speaker 1: and bibliographies and announcing things like merch drops, because guess
Speaker 1: what we're getting merch. The Treaty of Twas made Henry
Speaker 1: the Fifth of England next in line for the French throne,
Speaker 1: but Henry died before Charles did, which made Henry's son,
Speaker 1: Henry the sixth the next French king. Upon Charles's death,
Speaker 1: the baby was crowned in Paris at Notre Dame, but
Speaker 1: Charles's son, the Dauphin, who should have gotten the throne,
Speaker 1: didn't take that line down. He fought to win back
Speaker 1: his crown from the English usurpation, and the defa had
Speaker 1: an advantage. You see, there was this peasant who led
Speaker 1: a siege at Orleans that lasted only nine days, and
Speaker 1: then this peasant led the troops through another handful of
Speaker 1: quick and miraculous victories and allowed the Daufin to make
Speaker 1: it to Rhyme, where he would be crowned Charles the Seven. Eventually,
Speaker 1: this peasant, who bolstered the French troops to victory, would
Speaker 1: be captured by the Burgundian sect of French nobles who
Speaker 1: were allied with the English. I told you it got
Speaker 1: a little complicated between the Burgundians and Orleans. After being
Speaker 1: put on trial, the peasant was burned at the stake,
Speaker 1: but she was later canonized as a Catholic saint. She's
Speaker 1: sometimes called the Maid of Orleans, but you probably know
Speaker 1: her as Joan of Arc. Noble Blood is a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Minky.
Speaker 1: The show was written and hosted by Danis Schwartz and
Speaker 1: produced by Aaron Manky, Matt Frederick, Alex Williams, and Trevor Young.
Speaker 1: Noble Blood is on Social Idea at Noble Blood Tales,
Speaker 1: and you can learn more about the show over at
Speaker 1: Noble Blood Tales dot com. For more podcasts from I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. MHM