Escautpont

Escautpont (to pronounce " ékopon") is a common French, located in the department of the Northern and the area Nord-Pas-de-Calais.

Its inhabitants is called Escautpontois, Escautpontoises.

Geography

Escautpont is a commune with the rich past, located between the the Scheldt and the National forest.

Crossing right through by CD 935A, it offers an privileged access towards the highway A2 Paris-Brussels and on the the Scheldt channeled. It is served by the bus (line 14).

Escautpont belongs to the Communauté of agglomeration of the Door of Hainaut.

History

Not need to be scholar to understand that Escautpont draws its name from a bridge which passed to the top of the Scheldt.

Besides the blazon of Scaldis Pons, first name of the commune, keeps the trace of this bridge with three arches, on which the famous Brunehaut roadway passed, essential axis of the Roman era. Located at équidistance of Bavay and Turned (22 km), this monument, of a so important utility from the strategic point of view, was built under the reign of the emperor Claude or that of Néron, is at the beginning of the first century of our ère.
The origin of this name " Brunehaut" , would be due, according to some, with the little girl of Clovis, the queen Brunehaut (550 - 613) who was tortured and who died, attached by the hair and trail by a horse released to the gallop. For others, " Brunehaut" would be the deformation of " Limit Haute". On the Roman ways one found, all the thousand steps of the milliary columns (approximately every 1481 m) to indicate the distances.

The birth of Escautpont thus goes up at that time, since, quickly, a village developed around the work of art, whose ruins were updated by the Petit canon at the XIXe century. It is that the bridges were rare at that time. All the ways of the surroundings ended in it. It is at that time that the agricultural vocation (the blazon recalls it also) of Escautpont goes up, described like a relay of station, that is to say a rather important agglomeration. The major part of the cultivated grounds were given to the abbey of Saint-Amand into 847 by Charles the Bald person. They formed then part of a vassal seigniory of the county of Hainaut before being repurchased by the Abbey of Mortagne in 1265. It is at that time that the parish of Escautpont, until there indistinct from that of Vicq was detached some.

In 1655, under Louis XIV, a bridge was again thrown to the top of the Scheldt, so that the army of Turenne can evolve/move between Condé and Quesnoy. To counter the invasion Spanish, then Austrian, Escautpont was several times flooded. Its center also moved on several occasions. Concentrated around the Roman bridge, it migrated more to north, the place known as " The Step of Ayau" (drainage duct) then on left bank during the XIXe century, time when the commune made formidable industrial great strides, thanks to the establishment of glassmakings and breweries. The population made a jump (of 700 inhabitants in 1841 to 2200 in 1901), but it is nothing beside that caused by " The era of the houille" , whose beginning goes back to 1715. Because of the massive construction of residences undertaken, after 1918, by the Company of the mines of Anzin, the number of inhabitants passed to 4168 in 1931.

Stabilized until the Second world war, the population increased still clearly with new constructions of the Collieries, of which those of Trieu Midsummer's Day. This rise explains why Escautpont a long time formed two entities, the center and the mining cottages, to which came to be added since new districts and residences.

Administration

Demography

Places and monuments

Personalities related to the commune

Stanislas - singer

See too

• Common of North