NIMES, a city of southern France, capital of the department of Gard, 174 m. S. by W. of Lyons on the P.L.M. railway, between Avignon and Montpellier. Pop. (1931) 78,040.
Nimes, the ancient Nemausus, was named from the sacred wood in which the Volcae Arecomici (who surrendered to Rome in 121 B.C.) held their assemblies. Strabo states that it was the metropolis of a district containing 24 dependent towns, and that it was independent of the proconsuls of Gallia Narbonensis.
Constituted a colony of veterans by Augustus, and endowed with numerous privileges, it built a temple and struck a medal in honour of its founder. The medal, which afterwards furnished the type for the coat of arms granted to the town by Francis I., bears on one side the heads of Caesar Augustus and Vipsanius Agrippa (the former crowned with laurel), while on the other there is a crocodile chained to a palm-tree, with the legend COL.
broad, flanked by 90 towers and pierced by ten gates. Hadrian on his way back from Britain erected at Nimes two memorials of his benefactress Plotina. In the very height of its prosperity the city was ravaged by the Vandals ; the Visigoths followed, and turned the amphitheatre into a stronghold, which at a later date was set on fire along with the gates of the city when Charles Martel drove out the Saracens. Nimes became a republic under the protection of Pippin the Short ; and in 1185 it passed to the counts of Toulouse, who enclosed it with ramparts, less ex tensive than that of Augustus, still to be traced in the boulevards. The city took part in the crusade against the Albigenses in 1207.
Under Louis VIII. it received a royal garrison into its amphi theatre; under Louis XI. it was captured by the duke of Bur gundy, and in 1420 was recovered by the dauphin (Charles VII.). On a visit to Nimes Francis I. enriched it with a university and a school of arts. By 1558 about three-fourths of the inhabitants had become Protestants, and in 1567 a massacre of Catholics took place on St. Michael's day. From the accession of Henry IV. till the revocation of the edict of Nantes (1685) the Protestant community devoted itself to active industry; but after that disastrous event great numbers went into exile or joined the Camisards. Louis XIV. built a fortress (1687) to keep in check the disturbances caused by the rival religious parties. Nimes passed unhurt through the storms of the Revolution; but in 1815 Trestaillon and his bandit followers pillaged and burned and plundered and massacred the Bonapartists and Protestants.
Nimes lies at the foot of the Garrigues, a range of barren hills on the north and west. The most prominent of these is the Mont Cavalier, on the summit of which is the Tour Magne, a ruined Roman tower. To the south and east the town overlooks the plain of the Vistre, largely used for the vine. The central and oldest part of the town consists of low buildings and is encircled by boulevards, which occupy the site of the old fortifications. Here are to be found the majority of the Roman remains for which Nimes is remarkable. The most celebrated is the amphi theatre, the best preserved in France. It dates from the 1st. or 2nd century A.D. and was used as a fortress for some time during succeeding centuries. Occupied during the middle ages by a special quarter, with a church, it was cleared in 1809. It
is built of large stones fitted together without mortar. In form it is elliptical, measuring approximately 440 by 336 ft. externally; the arena is 227 by 1261 feet. The elevation (7o ft. in all) con sists of a ground story of 6o arches, an upper story of 6o arches and an attic with consoles pierced with holes for sup porting the velarium or awning. The building, which was capable of holding nearly 24,000 persons, has four main gates, one at each of the cardinal points ; and 124 doorways gave exit from the 35 tiers of the amphitheatre to the inner galleries. Orig inally designed for gladiatorial shows, naval spectacles, chariot races, wolf or boar hunts, the arena has in recent times been used for bull-fights. The celebrated Maison Carree, a Roman temple 82 ft. long by 4o wide, is a famous monument, and ac cording to an inscription is dedicated to Gaius and Lucius Caesar, adopted sons of Augustus, and dates from the beginning of the Christian era. It contains a collection of antique sculptures and coins. The so-called temple of Diana, which adjoins the Fountain gardens, was probably connected with the baths of which remains are visible near by. Two Roman gates, the Porte d'Auguste, con sisting of two large archways flanked by two smaller ones and dating from A.D. 16, and the Porte de France remain. The Tour Magne (Turns Magna) is still 92 ft. in height, and was formerly higher. It is the oldest monument of Nimes, but its use is not clear. It was turned into a fortress in the middle ages by the counts of Toulouse. Near the Tour Magne has been discovered the reservoir from which the water brought by the Pont du Gard (see AQUEDUCT) was distributed throughout the city.
With its capital, the temple of Augustus, the basilica of Plotina erected under Hadrian, the temple of Apollo, the baths, the theatre, the circus, constructed in the reign of Nero, the Campus Martius and the fortifications built by Augustus, Nimes must have been one of the richest of the Roman cities of Gaul. The cathedral (St. Castor), occupying, it is believed, the site of the temple of Augustus, is partly Romanesque and partly Gothic in style. The churches of St. Paul and St. Baudile are modern. The Fountain gardens owe their name to a spring of water which fluctuates considerably in volume, and discharges into the Vistre ; the town water comes from the Rhone. Alphonse Daudet and the Provençal poet Jean Reboul were natives of the town.
The city is the seat of a bishop under the archbishop of Avignon, a prefect, a court of appeal and a court of assizes, and has tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a board of trade arbitrators and a chamber of commerce. At the close of the middle ages the industries of Nimes received an impetus from a colony from Lombardy and Tuscany, and maintained their im portance, so that before the Revolution about half of the whole community were engaged in manufactures, chiefly that of silk. Upholstery materials, shawls, carpets, handkerchiefs, tapes and braidings, brandy, hosiery, leather, clothes, candles, machinery and boots and shoes are now manufactured, and there are a number of foundries. Nimes is, besides, a great market for wine and brandy, and there is a good trade in grain, groceries and colonial wares. Quarries of hard limestone, used for the amphitheatre and other Roman buildings, are still worked in the vicinity.