Cholet (, , probably from Latin cauletum, "cabbage") is a commune of western France in the Maine-et-Loire department. With 54,307 inhabitants (2019), it is the second most populous commune of Maine-et-Loire, after the prefecture Angers. Geography Cholet stands on an eminence on the right bank of the river Moine, which is crossed by a bridge from the fifteenth century. It is about 50 km southeast of Nantes. Cholet is the centre of the Agglomeration community of Cholet with about 107,000 inhabitants. It is the seat of the arrondissement of Cholet and of the cantons Cholet-1 and Cholet-2. History Numerous discoveries make it possible to prove the existence of a prehistoric presence on the territory of the commune. There were found, in particular, several polishers and thirty-three polished stone axes. From the Neolithic period, there are only three menhirs left in Cholet: one located at a place called "la Garde", a second ("la Pierre Plate") at a place called "la Pochetière" and a third ("le Grand menhir de la Garde") moved to the Mail garden in Cholet in 1885. Four other menhirs at a place called "Gué-au-Boin" and a fifth at "La Bréchoire" have been destroyed or have disappeared. The name of "De Cholet" family appears for the first time in the 11th century in the entourage of Lord Pierre I of Chemillé, who died in 1048. The first mention of a castle in Cholet dates from 1069. The town owes the rise of its prosperity to the settlement of weavers there by , count of Maulévrier, a brother of the great Jean-Baptiste Colbert. It then became an estate of and marquess of Cholet, who developed the town and its economy. The main commercial mall, opened in 2009, is named after him: the "Arcades Rougé". During the early years of the French revolutionary wars, the town found itself at the heart of the counter-revolutionary struggle in the Vendée, culminating in October 1793 with the Battle of Cholet which was won by the republicans and followed by a period of brutal government repression. Cholet suffered terrible destruction during the Vendée wars. The town was destroyed by 60 to 70% and lost 5,000 inhabitants, killed or missing, on a population of 8,400 to 8,500 before the conflict. On the edge of the inter-district road, near the aerodrome, a new monument commemorates this event in 1993 among six other crosses erected previously for the