Doudeville
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Commune of Doudeville |
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| Location | |
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| Administration | |
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| Country | France |
| Region | Haute-Normandie |
| Department | Seine-Maritime |
| Arrondissement | Rouen |
| Canton | Doudeville |
| Mayor | Daniel Durecu |
| Statistics | |
| Elevation | 85 m–156 m (avg. 120 m) |
| Land area¹ | 14.51 km² |
| Population² (1999) |
2,526 |
| - Density | 174/km² (1999) |
| Miscellaneous | |
| INSEE/Postal code | 76219/ 76560 |
| 1 French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km² (0.386 sq mi or 247 acres) and river estuaries. | |
| 2 Population sans doubles comptes: residents of multiple communes (e.g. students and military personnel) only counted once. | |
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Doudeville is a French commune, in the Canton of Doudeville, situated in the the arrondissement of Rouen, the département of Seine-Maritime and the région of Haute-Normandie.
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[edit] Geography
Called the flax capital, the town is situated at the centre of the Pays de Caux, the chalk plateau in High Normandy and one widely known for its fields of blue-flowered flax.
- Coordinates: 0.785 E, 49.722 N.
- Altitude of the commune: mean 120 m, lowest: 85 and highest 156 m.
- Area of the commune: 14.51 km².
- Altitude of the canton: about 150 m (500 ft.
- Area of the canton: 101.58 km².
[edit] Administration
[edit] The Commune
- the Commune is in the canton of Doudeville.
- Postal code: 76560
- INSEE code: 76219
- There are 2,526 inhabitants in the commune, its area is 14.51 km², giving a population density of 174/km².
- The Mayor is M. Daniel Durecu.
[edit] The Canton
The Canton of Doudeville includes the following communes: Amfreville Les Champs, Bénesville, Berville, Boudeville, Bretteville Saint Laurent, Canville Les Deux Églises, Doudeville itself, Étalleville, Fultot, Gonzeville, Harcanville, Hautot Saint Sulpice, Le Torp Mesnil, Prétot Vicquemare, Reuville, Saint Laurent En Caux, Yvecrique.
The canton's Population is 7 380, its land area is 101.58 square kilometres and the density of its population is 73 people/km². The General Council of the Seine Maritime Departement is composed of councillors elected by the cantons. Their term of office is six years and half are elected every three years. Doudeville's general councillor is Erick Malandrin, of the party Alternance 76, who is due for re-election in 2014.
[edit] History
At Doudeville, the General Assemblies of linen producers were held regularly - which is where the idea of Doudeville's claim to be linen capital arose. In the nineteenth century, there was a trade in linen cloth and canvas; enough to employ 8,000 people in ten businesses in the region.
[edit] Literary connection
Guy de Maupassant set a good number of his stories in this region. "The yard of the farm, enclosed by trees, seemed to sleep ... The shade of the apple trees gathered itself round their feet and the thatched roofs of the buildings at the summit of which grew irises ..." from The Story of a Farm Girl (Histoire d'une fille de ferme) by Guy de Maupassant. For more, see Pays de Caux.
[edit] Notable buildings
There are castles, manor houses with their dovecotes, majestic churches, little chapels and roadside calvaries carved from sandstone.
- Seventeenth century church.
- Château de Galleville (1680).
- In the villages around, imposing farms rub shoulders with the workers' and weaver's cottages.
- In the main villages around are the masters' houses of the rich manufacturers and merchants of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries who made their fortunes in the linen trade.
- For manor houses (manoirs), see Pays de Caux.
[edit] Town Hall
The Hôtel de Ville is a very large building in the Place du Général de Gaulle which was formerly la Place de l’Hôtel de Ville. It was built in about 1780 by François Louis Leseigneur; lord of Reuville and Galleville. Until the early nineteenth century, this was the trading centre for the linen cloth and siamoise, a cotton cloth which was common in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In 1852, the building was bought by the town and refurbished. At that time, the ground floor was a grain market, a prison and the caretaker’s lodging. The first floor housed the places in which the duties of the mayor and of the justices of the peace were carried out. At one time, as in many market halls, the ground floor was not fully enclosed. There were wide arched openings. The square in front of it held several small market buildings where traders such as pork butchers, butchers and shoemakers worked. It has undergone a major refurbishment which was due for completion in September 2007. pictures
[edit] Events
- In June, in the season of the blue flowers, the town has its flax (linen) festival.
- The commune of Doudeville was twinned with Bad Nenndorf, Lower Saxony, Germany, in 1978 and with the town of Bourne in Lincolnshire, England in October 1989.
