A woman's revenge

Jeanne de Clisson was a noblewoman. Then the French crown executed her husband without a fair trial. That turned her into something else entirely.

In the 1340s, after her husband, Olivier, was beheaded for supposed treason, Jeanne sold her lands, armed a fleet of ships, and declared war on the French king. She painted her flagship black and gave her sails a blood-red streak. This was no act of piracy for profit. It was revenge.

For over a decade, Jeanne hunted down French vessels in the English Channel. She targeted nobles, soldiers, and royal officials. Survivors were rare. Her attacks were fast, brutal, and personal. She earned a name that stuck: The Lioness of Brittany.

Eventually, she vanished from the sea, remarried, and faded from records. But for years, she was the most feared woman on the water. Not a myth. Not a legend. Just one furious widow who turned her grief into a campaign of revenge that the French crown couldn’t stop.