The (, ''

City Hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or municipal hall (in the Philippines) is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses the city o ...

'') is a municipal building in

Saint-Quentin, Aisne Saint-Quentin (; ; ) is a city in the Aisne Departments of France, department, Hauts-de-France, northern France. It has been identified as the ''Augusta Veromanduorum'' of antiquity. It is named after Saint Quentin, Saint Quentin of Amiens, wh ...

, northern France, standing on Place l'Hôtel de Ville. It was designated a ''

monument historique () is a designation given to some national heritage sites in France. It may also refer to the state procedure in France by which national heritage protection is extended to a building, a specific part of a building, a collection of buildings, ...

'' by the French government in 1984.

History

The first town hall in Saint-Quentin was the Maison du Plaid or Maison de la Paix which served as the meeting place of the provost and aldermen from the mid-13th century. The provost assembled the

bourgeoisie The bourgeoisie ( , ) are a class of business owners, merchants and wealthy people, in general, which emerged in the Late Middle Ages, originally as a "middle class" between the peasantry and aristocracy. They are traditionally contrasted wi ...

of the town there to consider pleas in 1332. The building contained two rooms: the Chambre du Haut Banquet (the banqueting hall) and the Chambre de Jugement (courtroom), and there was a square tower at the rear, which was used to store the municipal archives. In the late 15th century, the aldermen decided to demolish the existing building and to commission a new town hall. Construction of the new town hall started in the late 15th century. It was designed by Colard Noël from

Valenciennes Valenciennes (, also , , ; ; or ; ) is a communes of France, commune in the Nord (French department), Nord Departments of France, department, Hauts-de-France, France. It lies on the Scheldt () river. Although the city and region experienced ...

(who was also involved in rebuilding part of the

Basilica of Saint-Quentin The Basilica of Saint-Quentin (), formerly the Collegiate Church of Saint-Quentin () is a Catholic church in the town of Saint-Quentin, Aisne, France. There have been religious buildings on the site since the 4th century AD, which were repeated ...

), built in

ashlar Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...

stone and was completed in 1509. The design involved a symmetrical main frontage facing onto Place l'Hôtel de Ville. The ground floor featured a

loggia In architecture, a loggia ( , usually , ) is a covered exterior Long gallery, gallery or corridor, often on an upper level, sometimes on the ground level of a building. The corridor is open to the elements because its outer wall is only parti ...

formed by seven arches of varying widths with moulded surrounds and ornate carvings. The first floor was fenestrated by nine

mullion A mullion is a vertical element that forms a division between units of a window or screen, or is used decoratively. It is also often used as a division between double doors. When dividing adjacent window units its primary purpose is a rigid sup ...

ed and transomed windows with

tracery Tracery is an architectural device by which windows (or screens, panels, and vaults) are divided into sections of various proportions by stone ''bars'' or ''ribs'' of moulding. Most commonly, it refers to the stonework elements that support th ...

, moulded surroundings and ornate carvings. At roof level, there was a parapet with tracery and three gables each containing an oculus, with

finial A finial () or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the Apex (geometry), apex of a dome, spire, tower, roo ...

s at the corners. Internally, the principal rooms were the Salle du Conseil (council chamber) and L'Auditoire (audience chamber). The council chamber featured a fireplace with a large hood decorated with statuettes of the peers of France. It also featured a ceiling in the form of an upturned boat, decorated with painted stars and six carved heads depicting six significant characters of the town the 15th century. On 9 December 1589, the aldermen of the town entertained Henry IV in the council chamber. An

octagon In geometry, an octagon () is an eight-sided polygon or 8-gon. A '' regular octagon'' has Schläfli symbol and can also be constructed as a quasiregular truncated square, t, which alternates two types of edges. A truncated octagon, t is a ...

belfry The belfry /ˈbɛlfri/ is a structure enclosing bells for ringing as part of a building, usually as part of a bell tower or steeple. It can also refer to the entire tower or building, particularly in continental Europe for such a tower attached ...

, which was supported by a square base and equipped with 37 bells, was erected behind the centre gable in 1663. After it became unstable, it was restored in 1759. The town hall, like many other buildings in the town, was badly damaged by German shelling during the

First Battle of the Somme The Battle of the Somme (; ), also known as the Somme offensive, was a battle of the First World War fought by the armies of the British Empire and the French Third Republic against the German Empire. It took place between 1 July and 18 Nove ...

in March 1918. It was close to collapse when troops of the

French First Army The First Army () was a field army of France that fought during World War I and World War II. It was also active during the Cold War. World War I On mobilization in August 1914, General Auguste Dubail was put in the charge of the First Army, ...

led by General

Marie Eugène Debeney Marie Eugène Debeney (5 May 1864 – 6 November 1943) was a French Army general who fought in the First World War. He commanded a corps at the Battle of the Somme in 1916 then, in the second half of 1917, served as chief of staff to the French C ...

entered the town on 1 October 1918. A major programme of restoration works, undertaken to a design by Louis Guindez was completed in 1926. The work involved restoring the fabric of the former council chamber and converting it for use as the Salle des Mariages (wedding room). It also involved converting the audience chamber into a completely new council chamber, designed in the

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French (), is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design that first Art Deco in Paris, appeared in Paris in the 1910s just before World War I and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920 ...

style. The new council chamber was lined with 41 wooden panels crafted in

rosewood Rosewood is any of a number of richly hued hardwoods, often brownish with darker veining, but found in other colours. It is hard, tough, strong, and dense. True rosewoods come from trees of the genus '' Dalbergia'', but other woods are often ca ...

and Hungarian

oak An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisp ...

by the local cabinetmaker and carpenter, Émile Boussu. Above the mayor's chair was a wooden panel carved in

bas-relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces remain attached to a solid background of the same material. The term ''relief'' is from the Latin verb , to raise (). To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...

by Alphonse Émile Fivetto depicting

Marianne Marianne () has been the national personification of the French Republic since the French Revolution, as a personification of liberty, equality, fraternity and reason, as well as a portrayal of the Goddess of Liberty. Marianne is displayed i ...

. During the liberation of the town by

French Forces of the Interior The French Forces of the Interior (FFI; ) were French resistance fighters in the later stages of World War II. Charles de Gaulle used it as a formal name for the resistance fighters. The change in designation of these groups to FFI occurred as F ...

on 2 September 1944, during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, a skirmish took place outside the town hall with the liberators being fired upon from a German military vehicle.

References

Sources

* {{cite web, url= https://kulturpool.at/en/institutions/oenb/%252BZ228669504/ , title= Etude sur l'hotel-de-ville de Saint-Quentin, year=1858, last= Gomart, first= Charles, publisher=Doloy, location= Saint-Quentin Buildings and structures completed in 1509 City and town halls in France Monuments historiques of Aisne Government buildings completed in the 16th century