This text was copied from Wikipedia on 29 January at AM. Jean Balue [ 1 ] c. Born without resources, he managed to climb the political ladder by exploiting connections, to whom he often did not remain loyal, and by making himself an indispensable agent of the king's purposes in a time of political disorder in France. His services were as much military as ecclesiastical, bringing him the critical task of defending the city of Paris against the King's enemies.
His work as a diplomat in dealing with Duke Francis of Brittany and with Charles de France brought him the office of first minister to the King. Balue overreached himself in negotiating a treaty between the King and Charles the Bold, who had become Duke of Burgundy and was trying to recover all his family inheritance. Secret correspondence revealed that he might have been playing both sides in the negotiation, and he was arrested, and held on charges of treason from to , while King and Pope argued over jurisdiction.
He was born of very humble parentage at Angles-sur-l'Anglin in Poitou. The date of his birth is conjectured to be around , based on his epitaph in Santa Prassede in Rome, in which he is said to have died as Legate of the Marches while in his seventies, Legatum agens septuagenarius gloriose obiit.
Jean Balue had a brother Antoine and a brother Nicolas. In Balue is still referred to as 'clericus', but by he is called a priest. These are the parameters for his date of ordination to the priesthood.
The leader of the embassy was Bishop Jean Jouffroy of Arras, who had been named a cardinal on 18 December Marguerite in the Cathedral Chapter, which had just fallen vacant on the death of the Dean of the Chapter. The prebend, however, was in the gift of the Chapter, not the bishop, and they protested successfully to the Pope, who granted the prebend to the Chapter's candidate on 21 January Not satisfied with the result, Balue carried an appeal to the King.
