Olivier de Clisson

Olivier V de Clisson (23 April 1336 – 23 April 1407), nicknamed "The Butcher", was a Breton soldier, the son of Olivier IV de Clisson. His father had been put to death by the French in 1343 on the suspicion of having willingly given up the city of Vannes to the English. Biography Olivier de Clisson was born on 23 April 1336 at the Château de Clisson in Brittany. Clisson family context Olivier's father chose the camp of Charles de Blois and the King of France in the Breton War of Succession and was the military commander defending the city of Vannes when the English besieged it in 1342. His father was captured by the English and imprisoned, but was released after a relatively low ransom was paid. Because of the amount, the King of France, Philip VI and his advisers suspected Clisson of conspiring with King Edward III. After a peace treaty was signed, his father was invited to Paris for a tournament, but was arrested, tried and executed by beheading on 2 August 1343. This expeditious execution shocked the nobility as the evidence of guilt was never made public. Moreover, the notion of betrayal does not refer in the same way for nobles of that time: they claimed the right to choose whom to honor. Olivier IV's body received additional posthumous humiliation: his body was hanged by the armpits at the gallows at Montfaucon in Paris, and his head was piked at the Sauvetout gate of Nantes.