AMIENS (am-yan'), an old French city, the capital once of Picardy, and now of the department of Somme, on the many-channelled navigable Somme, 81 miles N. of Paris by rail. The Cathe dral of Notre Dame is a masterpiece of Gothic architecture. Begun in 1220, it is 452 feet long, and has a spire (1529) 426 feet high; but its special feature is the loftiness of the nave, 141 feet. Other noteworthy buildings are the Hotel de Ville (1600-1760), in which the Peace of Amiens was signed, the large museum (1864), in Renaissance style; and the public library, which was founded in 1791, and contains 70,000 vol umes. Amiens has considerable manu factures of velvet, silk, woolen, and cot ton goods, ribbons, and carpets. Peter tained possession of Ceylon and Trini dad, and an open port at the Cape of Good Hope; the republic of the Ionian islands was recognized; Malta was re the Hermit and Ducange were natives, and there are statues to both of them.
The Peace of Amiens (March 27, 1802) was a treaty intended to settle the dis puted points between England, France, Spain, and Holland. By it, England re stored to the Knights of St. John; Spain and Holland regained their colonies, with the exception of Trinidad and Cey lon; the French were to quit Rome and Naples; and Turkey was restored to its integrity. In the Franco-Prussian War, on Nov. 27, 1870, General Manteuff0 in flicted, near Amiens, a signal defeat on a French army 30,000 strong, and three days later the citadel surrendered. In the World War (1914-1918) it was a military center and railroad supply depot. It was an objective of the Ger mans in the last great drive in April, 1918, and narrowly escaped capture, but was badly damaged by German artillery fire. Pop. about 95,000.