Canton de Langeais, Arrondissement de Chinon.
Area: 3417 ha.
Inhabitants: the Mazériens
Origin of name: from the Latin maceria "boundary wall" and by extension "ruined building."
The town is set in an open clearing in the middle of a large expanse of woods and heathland. The development of the territory appears to date from the Gallic period or Gallo-Roman. After a period of neglect, colonization resumes, probably around the thirteenth century. The population decreases during the eighteenth century and increases in the following century with the clearing of heathland. The twentieth century witnessed an uneven demographic trends: the number of inhabitants actually increases at the end of the century. The church, some properties and the cave up the bulk of the heritage.
The first official census of the population of France took place in 1801 under Napoleon Bonaparte. Previously, it falls in the parish registers of Mazières a count of 561 inhabitants in 1761. Starting from 600 in 1801 Mazières saw its population drop to 547 in 1811, during the Napoleonic wars in which the town gave its tribute. With the agricultural revolution in the nineteenth century, the population grows to reach 967 inhabitants in 1901. The two world wars and the rural exodus are driving down the number to 608 in 1975. Since the population is growing steadily to 1108 inhabitants in 2005.
