[en] To complement the program on hot nuclei undertaken at GANIL by the Orion collaboration, an experiment aiming at producing hot nuclei in reactions induced by highly energetic particles has been performed at SATURNE. The inclusive neutron multiplicity distribution for the 2 GeV p+¹⁹⁷Au reaction is presented and discussed. The overall distribution is reasonably well reproduced by assuming that an intranuclear cascade takes place initially and that, subsequently, the thermalized excited system deexcites statistically. (author) 7 refs., 5 figs