BRIOUDE, town of France, capital of an arrondissement in the department of Haute-Loire, on the left bank of the Allier, 47m. N.W. of Le Puy on the P.L.M. railway. Pop. 4479 Brioude (anc. Brivas) was in turn captured by Goths (532), Burgundians, Saracens (73 2) and Normans. After 1361 the town was the headquarters of Berenger, lord of Castelnau, who was leader of one of the bands of military adventurers which then devastated France. The knights (or canons) of St. Julian bore the title of counts of Brioude. The town has to a great extent escaped modernization, and its streets are narrow and irregular. The church of St. Julian (12th and 13th centuries) is in the Romanesque style of Auvergne, of which the choir, with its apse and radiating chapels and the mosaic ornamentation of the ex terior, is a fine example. The plain in which it is situated is of great fertility; trade in grain, wood and wine is considerable, and market-gardening is carried on in the outskirts. Brioude is the seat of a sub-prefect, and of tribunals of first instance and of commerce.