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Aubriot’s intervention in the case of the Jews gave the University its handle for revenge. Accused of heresy, sodomy, and being a false Christian, and, specifically, of “profaning the sanctity of baptism” by returning the Jewish children, he was brought to trial before the Bishop of Paris in May 1381. Besides charges of voicing contempt for the Eucharist, failure to take communion at Easter, and public disrespect of the clergy, he was accused of neglect of a virtuous wife, of buying virgins, and having “recourse to sorcery that his passions might triumph,” of imprisoning husbands to have freedom with their wives, of cohabiting bestially with women against nature and having carnal relations with Jews.

Convicted, but spared a death sentence by Burgundy’s influence, he was exposed on a wooden platform in front of the cathedral, where, on his knees and hatless, he was obliged to beg for absolution and vow an offering of candles for the baptized Jews he had returned to their parents. Absolved by the Bishop and Rector of the University, he was then condemned to perpetual penitence in prison on bread and water. His removal, contributing to the weakening of government, left the people of Paris readier to rise.

Coucy during these uneasy happenings remained in the Royal Council on good terms with the Dukes, each of whom desired his support. One of Anjou’s first acts as Regent, on September 27, had been to confirm Coucy in lifetime possession of Mortaigne on the Channel, bestowed on him by the late King. In addition to grand estate, Coucy clearly possessed a personal power of attraction and a faculty for not making enemies. In the great game of “who’s in, who’s out,” he was always able to work with whoever held power, perhaps owing to political sophistication gained from the circumstances of his marriage. After accomplishing the treaty of peace with the Duke of Brittany in January 1381, he was sent once more as ambassador to the English at Montreuil to negotiate a dispute over terms of the truce. Later in the year, documents show him paying spies for information on Calais, Guînes, and other English fortresses. While charged with defense of the frontier, he was recalled to Paris in May to advise Anjou on his projects in Italy.

Spoiling for a kingdom, Anjou needed money. Informed of the treasure stored by Charles V at Melun for the use of his son, Anjou laid hold of it by the direct expedient of threatening to execute the guardian of the fund. The Monk of St. Denis, however, does not vouch for this story because “one never knows the truth about these things that take place in the shadow.” Whatever Anjou obtained, it was not enough. He continued pressing for aids through 1381, winning a few grants here and there, but generally meeting sullen resistance.

While France smoldered, true revolt erupted in June 1381 in England, not of the urban class but of the peasants. In a country whose economy was largely rural, they were the working class that mattered. The third poll tax in four years, to include everyone over the age of fifteen, was the precipitant. Voted in November 1380 by a subservient Parliament to finance Lancaster’s ambitions in Spain, the collection brought in only two thirds of the expected sum, not least because tax commissioners were easily bribed to overlook families or falsify their numbers. A second round of collecting became necessary, which could have been foreseen as an invitation to trouble if the lords and prelates and royal uncles of Richard’s government had paid attention to the constant complaints of rural insubordination. They did not, and brought upon themselves the most fearful challenge of the century.

At the end of May, villages in Essex on the east coast just above London refused payment; the resistance spread with some evidence of planning, and burst into violence in Kent, the adjoining county south of the Thames. Peasants mingled with yeomen from the French wars armed themselves with rusty swords, scythes, axes, and longbows blackened