Artins

Artins
The road into Artins
Coat of arms
Artins
Location within Centre region Artins
Coordinates:
Country	France
Region	Centre-Val de Loire
Department	Loir-et-Cher
Arrondissement	Vendôme
Canton	Montoire-sur-le-Loir
Intercommunality	Pays de Ronsard
Government
• Mayor	Henri Daumas
Area1	11.72 km2 (4.53 sq mi)
Population (2009)2	295
• Density	25/km2 (65/sq mi)
INSEE/Postal code	41004 / 41800
Elevation	57–139 m (187–456 ft) (avg. 80 m or 260 ft)
1 French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km² (0.386 sq mi or 247 acres) and river estuaries. 2 Population without double counting: residents of multiple communes (e.g., students and military personnel) only counted once.

Artins is a commune in the Loir-et-Cher département in central France.

Population

Historical population
Year	Pop.	±%
1793	492	—
1800	480	−2.4%
1806	516	+7.5%
1821	508	−1.6%
1831	531	+4.5%
1836	506	−4.7%
1841	489	−3.4%
1846	500	+2.2%
1851	502	+0.4%
1856	501	−0.2%
1861	513	+2.4%
1866	485	−5.5%
1872	486	+0.2%
1876	471	−3.1%
1881	468	−0.6%
1886	468	+0.0%
1891	468	+0.0%
1896	482	+3.0%
1901	501	+3.9%
1906	502	+0.2%
1911	534	+6.4%
1921	446	−16.5%
1926	448	+0.4%
1931	401	−10.5%
1936	394	−1.7%
1946	428	+8.6%
1954	363	−15.2%
1962	336	−7.4%
1968	317	−5.7%
1975	265	−16.4%
1982	272	+2.6%
1990	247	−9.2%
1999	282	+14.2%
2006	280	−0.7%
2009	295	+5.4%

History

The name derives from the Gallo-Roman Artinis.

The historic Romanesque church, dedicated to Saint Julien (of Le Mans), at a ford in the Loir river, fell into ruins when development occurred nearer a departmental route at a site known as Le Plat d'Etain. It has since been restored by local initiative for cultural purposes.

Popular tradition would have it that Artins is older than Le Mans (the ecclesiastical centre of the diocese to which Artins formerly belonged) and that St. Julien evinced a dragon who had taken up residence in a temple (which was replaced by the former church). A pilgrimage celebrating this feat survived into the mid-twentieth century.

The hillside is marked by a former Commanderie and the manor of Rocheturpin (which lost its Romanesque chapel in the late nineteenth century). Just below these and above the Plat d'Etain is the present neo-gothic church. The lower hillside is marked by a series of caves often used as wine-cellars.

See also

• Communes of the Loir-et-Cher department

References

• INSEE statistics