BEZIERS, town of France, capital of an arrondissement, department of Herault, 47m. S.W. of Montpellier by rail. Pop. (1930 64,888. Beziers lies in a wine-growing district, on a hill on the left bank of the Orb, joined at this point by the Canal du Midi. The Romans established a colony here. The name Besara occurs as early as Festus Avienus (later 4th century). The town was destroyed with a great massacre in 1209 by de Montfort in the crusade against the Albigenses. The walls were rebuilt in 1289; but the town suffered severely in the wars of the 16th century, and all its fortifications were destroyed in 1632. The Allee Paul Riquet divides the old town on the west from the new town on the east. Above the old ramparts towers St. Nazaire, the former cathedral (12th to 14th centuries), a good specimen of the ecclesiastical fortification common in southern France. It has a rose window in the western façade, and stained glass and iron grilles in the choir-windows (14th century). Adjoining the south transept there are Gothic cloisters of the 14th century. There are also remains of a Roman arena. Road, canal and rail way cross the Orb at Beziers. It is a market for wine, brandy, manure, chemical products, grain and flour. Beziers is the seat of a sub-prefect and has tribunals of first instance and of corn merce, and several learned societies.