Be the most violent man of your time.
Be the most virtuous man of your time.
Be born to lower nobility.
Your father, grandfather, and great-grandfather all die in battles for France.
Win a horsemanship contest in front of the King at 13.
Win a tournament in front of the King at 18.
Capture an enemy standard in battle at 19. Knighted immediately.
Fight a public duel to the death against giant Spanish warrior at 26.
Hold off 250 enemy Spanish knights on a bridge by yourself so your army doesn't get obliterated. Survive.
Pope asks you to command his armies and offers immense salary.
Write the Pope to say you'd rather be a humble soldier for your King than a foreign Prince.
Win the battle of Genoa by leading a seemingly impossible cavalry charge uphill.
Put in charge of a small contingent of French army. Revitalize the army with the discipline and skill of your own men.
Hang out with Emperor Maximillian at the failed siege of Padua (not your fault).
Nearly capture the Pope in a raid near Ferrara.
Oversee a duel as Master of the Lists for The Italian Thunderbolt Gaston Le Foix.
Lead dismounted men-at-arms in repeated charges to win the siege of Brescia. Suffer bad thigh injury.
Allow your men to take you to a commoners house to recover.
Need to leave before you are fully recovered because a huge battle is brewing at Ravenna.
Leave the commoners, a mother and her daughters, with a thousand gold pieces when you leave.
When the enemy discovers you have personally arrived at Ravenna, they exclaim your value on the field is equivalent to 2,000 men.
Your personal bravery in leading decisive charges carries the day at Ravenna but the last minute loss of your captain and friend Gaston Le Foix is strategic catastrophe for France and devastating personal loss for you.
Many of your friends and associates become mercenaries, chasing wealth far exceeding your own.
You are disinterested in chasing wealth.
Among savages, earn a reputation for (aside from your supreme savagery) your kindness and light-heartedness.
Captured by the King of England in battle.
Released on the sole promise to not fight for six weeks.
Don't fight for six weeks.
Battle of Marignano with new King Francis I. Carry the day with the King. King asks you to knight him on the field of battle afterwards.
You are now lieutenant-general of the French army.
Hold the city of Mezieres with 1,000 men against 35,000 Holy Roman Empire besiegers.
All of France celebrates your achievement.
Named to the Order of St. Michael.
King orders you are allowed to command 100 knights in your own name, a privilege reserved for Princes of the Blood.
When the army is on the march, ride at the front of the vanguard and forbid your troops from looting and pillaging the locals. Placing sentries at churches to guard the women taking shelter inside from being raped as the army passes.
When the army is retreating, ride at the very back putting out fires and helping villagers recover from the passing of the front of the army.
Paid peasants from his own pocket whenever he needed anything on campaign.
Wherever you pass, locals and peasants rush to the army to bring you gifts. Unheard of.
In your own lifetime given many nicknames and epithets, including "beyond fear and reproach".
Prefer to just be called "Le Bon Chevalier" (The Good Knight).
At the Battle of the Sesia River, be fighting at the back of the rearguard as the army retreats.
Hit with an arquebus ball.
Left to die under a tree.
Enemy surrounds you, including Italian captain Pescara and your old comrade the Duke of Bourbon who defected to the Italians.
Duke of Bourbon says to you, "Ah! Monsieur.. I am very sad to see you in this state; you who were such a virtuous knight!"
Respond to the Duke of Bourbon before you die, "Sir, there is no need to pity me. I die as a man of honor ought, doing my duty; but I pity you, because you are fighting against your king, your country, and your oath."
Be one of the best who ever did it.
Be The Chevalier Bayard.
-Memory Medieval (substack)
