COMPIEGNE, a town of northern France, capital of an arrondissement, department of Oise, 52 m. N.N.E. of Paris, famous for its château, park and forest. Pop. (1931) 14,991. The town, which is a favourite summer resort, stands on the north-west border of the forest of Compiegne and on the left bank of the Oise, near its confluence with the Aisne. The river is crossed by a bridge built in the reign of Louis XV.
Compiegne (Compendium) seems originally to have been a hunting-lodge of the early Frankish kings. It was enriched by Charles the Bald with two castles, and a Benedictine abbey dedi cated to Saint Corneille, the monks of which retained down to the i8th century the privilege of acting for three days as lords of Compiegne, with full judicial privileges. It was in Compiegne that King Louis I. the Debonair was deposed in 833 ; and at the siege of the town in 143o Joan of Arc was taken prisoner by the English. A monument to her faces the hotel de ville. The treaty of Compiegne, between Richelieu and the Dutch, was signed here in 1624. In 1814 Compiegne offered a stubborn resistance to the Prussian troops. Under Napoleon III. it was the annual resort of the court during the bunting season. From 18 7o to 1871 it was one of the headquarters of the German army. The town was again occupied by the Germans in 1914, and was bombarded in 1918, but most of the older buildings escaped serious injury.
The hotel de ville, with a graceful facade surmounted by a lofty belfry, is late Gothic (early 16th century) . Of the churches, St. Antoine (13th and i6th centuries) has some fine Renaissance stained glass, and St. Jacques dates from the 13th and 15th cen turies. The remains of the ancient abbey of St. Corneille are used as a military storehouse. Compiegne, from a very early period until 187o, was the occasional residence of the French kings. Its magnificent palace (château), now an art museum, was erected chiefly by Louis XV. and restored by Napoleon I. It has two facades, one overlooking the town, the other facing towards a fine park and the forest (55 sq.m.) , which is chiefly of oak and beech and was formerly considered one of the strategic defences of Paris. Compiegne is the seat of a subprefect, and has tribunals of first instance and of commerce. The industries comprise boat building, rope-making, cooperage and copper and iron founding. Asparagus is cultivated in the environs. There is river-borne trade in timber and coal.