[doo-ey; Fr. dwe] 
| a city in N France, SE of Calais. 47,570. |
| Dou·ai (dōō-ā') A town of northern France northeast of Amiens. Under the patronage of Philip II of Spain a Roman Catholic college for English priests was established here. It produced an English translation of the Bible in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. Population: 43,200. |
Douai
town, northern France, in the Nord departement, Nord-Pas-de-Calais region. It is situated in flat country on the Scarpe River, 24 miles (39 km) south of Lille and 13 miles southwest of the Belgian border. Douai was once a coal-mining centre with related chemical and engineering works; now its industrial economy is dominated by the automobile and automobile-components industries. Other manufactures include railway equipment and food products. The Government Publications Office is located in Douai. The original university, founded in 1562, was transferred to Lille in 1887, but in 1993 the law faculty of the University of Artois was established in the town, joining existing graduate schools. The magnificent Gothic belfry, built in 1380, is 130 feet (40 m) high and has a carillon of 49 bells, installed in 1954 to replace the one destroyed by the Germans during World War I. The church of Notre-Dame was badly damaged in 1944, but its 13th-century nave has been restored. The museum of the Carthusian monastery La Chartreuse (16th-18th century) has a fine collection of 16th-century paintings.
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