Arcis-le-Ponsart

Until the early nineteenth century, the town was called Arcis-le-Poussart or simply Pousard.[3] The name Arcis comes from the Latin word "arx", meaning "fortified place"; and the nickname Ponsart refers to a former local knight from Arcy, Ponsard.[4]

Église Notre-Dame

In 1127, Bernard of Clairvaux founded Igny Abbey on land purchased from Ponsard.[4] During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the monks of this abbey cleared and cultivated the land and surrounding forests. Arcis-le-Ponsard was damaged repeatedly, including the troops of the Hundred Years War, those of Charles V, the Franco-Spanish War (1635–1659), the French Revolutionary Wars, and the Prussian and Russian armies of 1814.[4] During the First World War, a military camp was installed here.

The Église Notre-Dame, a ruin, is attributed partly to twelfth century and partly Renaissance style.[5] It became a historical monument on November 18, 1919. The Abbaye Notre-Dame d'Igny was founded in the 1120s by monks from the Abbey of Clairvaux, sent by St. Bernard of Clairvaux. Following a pilgrimage to the abbey which brought rapid development, a daughter house, Signy Abbey, was founded in 1135. The second abbot, Guerric of Igny, was raised to the rank of Blessed; his relics are still venerated in Igny.[6] At the time of the French Revolution, the religious community was dispersed. It was rebuilt in 1780.[5] Monastic life resumed in 1876 with the support of the Diocese of Reims. Destroyed in 1918, the abbey was rebuilt in 1929 and occupied by a community of nuns from Laval.

• Communes of the Marne department