Somewhere along the line, a modern author invented the notion
that Joan was "really" an English aristocrat rather than a
French peasant. The usual type of specious arguments can be
cited to give this claim the illusion of credibility: for instance,
there's
a scribal error in a single document by which Joan is referred to
as "the Maid of England" instead of "the Maid of France".
All the other documents describe her as a native of
France, of course.
The revisionists could additionally engage in a
still more subtle distortion with regard to Joan's 15th century usage
of the word
"France": she often talked about "going to France" from her home
village, which might give the impression that she was a foreigner
to anyone who doesn't understand the medieval usage of this term.
Originally, the word "France" referred only to the direct Royal domain,
the area of north-central France known today as the "Ile-de-France",
and it retained a similar usage in the 15th century. Hence, Joan and
her contemporaries often used it to refer to the Royal (Valois)
territories, or to the central core of the kingdom - whereas Joan's home village
lay within the Duchy of Bar in the far eastern portion of the Kingdom
of France, in an area dominated at that time by the Burgundian faction.
This is the context for her usage of the term; but modern pop authors
who think of "France" as a tourist destination would obviously see a
different meaning.