Bataille de Crécy

This historicizing illustration, published in Jules Janin’s book « La Normandie », depicts the Battle of Crécy, fought on 26 August 1346 during the Hundred Years’ War. It evokes the clash between the forces of King Edward III of England and those of King Philip VI of France, one of the major French defeats at the beginning of the conflict. The scene emphasizes the violence of medieval battle, with horsemen, infantry, smoke, and bodies strewn across the ground, in a dramatic composition typical of nineteenth-century historical illustration. The image is not a contemporary witness to the event, but a later visual reinterpretation intended to preserve its memory in a spectacular and narrative form.