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Béziers (Municipality, Hérault, France)

Flag of Béziers - Image by Olivier Touzeau, 21 December 2020

Presentation of Béziers
Flags of Béziers

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Presentation of Béziers

Béziers (80,341 inhabitants in 2021; 9,548 ha) is a commune and subprefecture of the Hérault department.

Béziers is one of the oldest cities in France.The site has been occupied since Neolithic times, before the influx of Celts. Roman Betarra was on the road that linked Provence with Iberia. The Romans refounded the city as a new colonia for veterans in 36–35 BC and called it Colonia Julia Baeterrae Septimanorum. Stones from the Roman amphitheatre were used to construct the city wall during the 3rd century. From the 10th to the 12th century, Béziers was the centre of a Viscountship. The viscounts ruled most of the coastal plain around Béziers, including the town of Agde.

In the 12th century Béziers was a stronghold of the viscounts of Carcassonne. At the death of Roger Count of Carcassonne (1067), Béziers passed to his sister Ermengard and her husband Raimond-Bertrand Trencavel. The Trencavels ruled for the next 142 years, until the Albigensian Crusade, a formal crusade authorised by Pope Innocent III. Béziers was a Languedoc stronghold of Catharism, which the Catholic Church condemned as heretical and which Catholic forces exterminated in the Albigensian Crusade. Béziers was the first place to be attacked. The crusaders reached the town on 21 July 1209. Béziers' Catholics were given an ultimatum to hand over the heretics or leave before the crusaders besieged the city. However, many refused and resisted with the Cathars. The town was sacked the following day and in the bloody massacre no one was spared, not even Catholic priests and those who took refuge in the churches. One of the commanders of the crusade was the Papal legate Arnaud-Amaury (or Arnald Amalaricus, Abbot of Citeaux). When asked by a crusader how to tell Catholics from Cathars once they had taken the city, the abbot is reported to have replied, "Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius" ("Kill them all, for the Lord knoweth them that are His"). The invaders burned the Cathedral of Saint Nazaire, which collapsed on those who had taken refuge inside. The town was pillaged and burnt.

Béziers became part of the royal domain in 1247. The city walls, rebuilt in 1289, were destroyed in 1632. The former cathedral of Saint-Nazaire, dominating the old town, is a typical ecclesiastical fortification of the 13th–14th century. In 1551, Béziers became the seat of a seneschal, being removed from the jurisdiction of the seneschals of Carcassonne.

During the 18th century, Béziers prospered, notably thanks to the cultivation of vines which enabled it to become an important centre for alcohol trading. The Revolt of the Languedoc winegrowers was a mass movement in 1907 in Languedoc and the Pyrénées-Orientales of France that was repressed by the government of Georges Clemenceau. It was caused by a serious crisis in winemaking at the start of the 20th century. On 12 May 1907, no less than 150,000 protesters gathered in Béziers with the declared aim of "Defending the Southern Viticulture". On the evening of 20 June, learning of the Narbonne shooting, about 500 soldiers of the 6th company of the 17th regiment mutinied, plundered the armory and headed for Béziers. They traveled about twenty kilometers by night. On 21 June, in the early morning, they arrived in town. They were warmly welcomed by the inhabitants, fraternizing with the demonstrators. In Paulhan, the railway was taken out of commission by protesters who stopped a military convoy sent to quell the mutineers. In Lodève, the sub-prefect was taken hostage. The military authorities were not ready to accept this mutiny, but Clemenceau let the military command urgently negotiate with the mutineers. In the afternoon, after obtaining a guarantee that no sanctions will be imposed on them, the 17th regiment's soldiers put down their arms and marched to the station under escort, without any major incident. On 22 June, they returned by train to their barracks. Clemenceau announced the end of the mutiny and gained a parliamentary vote of confidence. On 23 June, a law was finally passed, which repressed the massive chaptalisation of the wines.

Olivier Touzeau, 21 December 2020

Flag of Béziers

The flag of Béziers is vertically divided blue and red blue, with the coat of arms in the center: photo (2020), photo (2020), photo (2020).

The arms are blazonned Argent three bars gules a chief azure three fleurs de lis or. The three bars Gules on a field Argent come from the Arms of the Trencavel family.
The name “ Béziers” in inscribed in the crown.

Olivier Touzeau, 21 December 2020