"As the huge crowd seethed with pent-up excitement, the two deadly
enemies studied each other intently, their breath hot behind their
visors. Each sought the other's death as fire and water seek each
other's annihilation. The walled field, at first a prison, now
became a crucible where one man would be destroyed and the other
purged in the name of justice. They would fight not only without
quarter, but also without rules. And a horrible fate awaited the
lady if her husband should lose . . .
The gripping, atmospheric true story of the "duel to end all
duels" in medieval France: a trial by combat pitting a knight
against a squire accused of violating the knight's beautiful young
wife
In 1386, a few days after Christmas, a huge crowd gathers at a
Paris monastery to watch the two men fight a duel to the death
meant to "prove" which man's cause is right in God's sight. The
dramatic true story of the knight, the squire, and the lady unfolds
during the devastating Hundred Years War between France and
England, as enemy troops pillage the land, madness haunts the
French court, the Great Schism splits the Church, Muslim armies
threaten Christendom, and rebellion, treachery, and plague turn the
lives of all into toys of Fortune.
At the heart of the tale is Jean de Carrouges, a Norman knight who
returns from combat in Scotland to find his wife, Marguerite,
accusing Jacques LeGris, her husband's old friend and fellow
courtier, of brutally raping her. The knight takes his cause before
the teenage King Charles VI, the highest judge in France. Amid
LeGris's vociferous claims of innocence and doubts about the now
pregnant Marguerite's charges (and about the paternity of her
child), thedeadlocked court decrees a "trial by combat" that leaves
her fate, too, in the balance. For if her husband and champion
loses the duel, she will be put to death as a false accuser.
Carrouges and LeGris, in full armor, eventually meet on a walled
field in Paris before a massive crowd that includes the king and
many nobles of the realm. A fierce fight on horseback and then on
foot ensues during which both combatants suffer wounds--but only
one fatal. The violent and tragic episode was notorious in its own
time because of the nature of the alleged crime, the legal impasse
it provoked, and the resulting trial by combat, an ancient but
increasingly suspect institution that was thereafter
abolished.
Based on extensive research in Normandy and Paris, "The Last Duel
brings to life a colorful, turbulent age and three unforgettable
characters caught in a fatal triangle of crime, scandal, and
revenge. It is at once a moving human drama, a captivating
detective story, and an engrossing work of historical intrigue.
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