The city was founded by the Romans, in the
Augustean period, to replace the
oppidum of
Vermand (11 km away) as the capital of
Viromandui (Celtic Belgian people who occupied the region). It received the name "
Augusta Viromanduorum",
Augusta of the
Viromandui, in honor of the emperor Augustus. The site is that of a
ford across the
River Somme. During the late Roman period, it is possible that the
civitas capital was transferred back to
Vermand (whose name comes from
Veromandis); almost nothing relating to the fourth century has been found in Saint-Quentin. During the early Middle Ages, a major monastery, now the
Basilica of Saint-Quentin, developed, based on pilgrimage to the tomb of
Quentin, a Roman Christian who came to evangelize the region and was martyred in Augusta, giving rise to a new town which was named after him. From the 9th century, Saint-Quentin was the capital of
Vermandois County. From the 10th century, the counts of Vermandois (descendants of the
Carolingian, then
Capetian families) were very powerful. The city grew rapidly: the
"bourgeois" organized themselves and obtained, in the second half of the 12th century (a very early date), a
municipal charter, which guaranteed their
commune a large degree of autonomy. At the beginning of the 13th century, Saint-Quentin entered the
royal domain. At that time, it was a thriving city, based on its wool textile industry (city "drapante"). It was also a centre of commerce boosted by its position on the border of the kingdom of France, between the
Champagne fairs and the cities of
Flanders (wine exportation, etc.): it had an important annual fair. It also benefited from its location in the heart of a rich agricultural region (trade of grain and "guède" (
woad), a high-value blue dye). From the 14th century, Saint-Quentin suffered from this strategic position: it endured the French-English wars (
Hundred Years' War). In the 15th century, the city was disputed between the king of France and the
dukes of Burgundy (it is one of the "cities of the Somme"). Ravaged by the
plague on several occasions, its population decreased, while its economy was in crisis: its fair was increasingly irrelevant, and agricultural production diminished. The declining textile industry turned to the production of
linen canvas. Meanwhile, the city faced major expenses to maintain its fortifications and armed troops. Between the end of the 15th century and the mid-17th century, this strategic position was the cause of frequent misfortune. In 1557, a siege by the Spanish army (as part of the
battle of Saint-Quentin) ended with the looting of the city and its desertion for two years. Given back to France in 1559, it underwent intense fortification work: the medieval wall, redesigned several times, was protected by many new advanced fortifications. Two districts were razed to make way for them. In the mid-17th century, the city escaped the sieges, but suffered the horrors of wars ravaging the
Picardy region, accompanied by the plague (in 1636, 3,000 people died, out of perhaps 10,000 inhabitants) and famine. In the second half of the 17th century, the conquests of
Louis XIV moved the border away from Saint-Quentin, and it lost much of its strategic role. At the end of the 16th century, its textile production specialized in fine flax canvas (
batiste and
lawn). This brought prosperity, particularly in the 18th century, when these textiles were exported across Europe and the Americas. During the
First French Empire, difficulties in the export market brought economic decline. At the request of the municipality,
Napoleon ordered the razing of the fortifications, to allow the city to grow beyond its old boundaries. In 1814–1815, Saint-Quentin was occupied by the
Russian army, but without any damage. In the 19th century, Saint-Quentin developed into a thriving industrial city, thanks to entrepreneurs constantly on the lookout for new technologies. Textiles and mechanical devices were foremost among a wide variety of products. In 1870, during the
Franco-Prussian War, the population repelled the Prussians on 8 October, but the city fell during the second offensive. The hopeless but heroic action had national repercussions: Saint-Quentin was decorated with the
Legion of Honour. On 19 January 1871 the French army was
defeated near the town. During the
repression of January and February 1894, the police conducted raids targeting the
anarchists living there, without much success. . The
First World War hit Saint-Quentin very hard. In September 1914, the city was overrun; it endured a harsh occupation. From 1916, it lay at the heart of the war zone, because the Germans had integrated it into the
Hindenburg Line. After the evacuation of the population in March, the town was systematically looted and industrial equipment removed or destroyed. The
fighting destroyed it: 80% of buildings (including the
Basilica of Saint-Quentin) were damaged. Despite national support, the reconstruction process was long, and the city struggled to regain its pre-1914 dynamism. The 1911 population of 55,000 was achieved again only in the mid-1950s, in the context of general economic expansion. This prosperity continued until the mid-1970s, when the French textile industry began to suffer through competition from
developing countries. ==Climate==