At Béziers, the Canal du Midi passes over the river Orb by means of the Pont-canal de l'Orb, an aqueduct claimed to be the first of its kind.

They also controlled the major east–west route through Languedoc, which roughly follows the old Roman Via Domitia, with the two key bridges over the Orb at Béziers and over the Hérault at Saint-Thibéry.

[citation needed] After the death of Viscount William around 990, the viscounty passed to his daughter Garsendis and her husband, Count Raimond-Roger of Carcassonne (d. c. 1012).

[citation needed] Roger died without issue and Béziers passed to his sister Ermengard and her husband Raimond-Bertrand Trencavel.

[citation needed] Béziers was a stronghold of Catharism, which the Catholic Church condemned as heretical and exterminated in the Albigensian Crusade.

Béziers' Catholics were given an ultimatum to hand over the heretics or leave before the crusaders besieged the city and to "avoid sharing their fate and perishing with them".

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.

[citation needed] One of the commanders of the crusade was the Papal legate Arnaud-Amaury (or Arnald Amalaricus, abbot of Citeaux).

(This oft-quoted phrase is sourced from Caesarius of Heisterbach along with a story of all the heretics who desecrated a copy of the Gospels and threw it down from the town's walls.

[9]) Amalric's own version of the siege, described in his letter to Pope Innocent III in August 1209 (col. 139), states: While discussions were still going on with the barons about the release of those in the city who were deemed to be Catholics, the servants and other persons of low rank and unarmed attacked the city without waiting for orders from their leaders.

After this great slaughter the whole city was despoiled and burnt ...[10]The invaders burned the Cathedral of Saint Nazaire, which collapsed on those who had taken refuge inside.

[citation needed] (A plaque opposite the cathedral records the "Day of Butchery" perpetrated by the "northern barons".

All four lived there and were members of the urban middle class and no courtesans: Miralhas was possibly a potter and Bernart a teacher.

Raimon Gaucelm supported the Eighth Crusade and even wrote a planh, the only known one of its kind, to a burgher of Béziers.

On 8 September 1381, a riot broke out at the seat of the municipal council, rioters setting the Town House on fire.

During the War of the Spanish Succession, the British in 1710 landed at Sète and moved to within a few kilometres of Béziers, before being repulsed by the Duke of Roquelaure.

It was in Béziers that Gaston d'Orléans and Henri II de Montmorency, Governor of Languedoc, met at the beginning of the rebellion.

During the 18th century, Béziers prospered, notably thanks to the cultivation of vines which enabled it to become an important centre for alcohol trading.

In the repression following Louis Napoléon's coup d'état in 1851, troops fired on and killed Republican protesters in Béziers.

Others were condemned to death or transported to Guiana, including Casimir Péret, the mayor at the time, who died at sea attempting to escape from there.

In the Place de la Révolution a plaque and a monument by Jean Antoine Injalbert commemorates these events.

While elsewhere in France, the area planted with vines was decreasing, it increased in the departments of Aude, Gard, Hérault and the Pyrénées-Orientales.

Large landowners, coming from industry, finance or the liberal professions, gained possession of immense vineyards.

the Speakers included Marcelin Albert who issued an ultimatum to the government, demanding that it raise the price of wine, Ernest Ferroul who advocated tax refusal and the Béziers Mayor Émile Suchon, (close to Clemenceau), who took a stand in support of the winegrowers' struggle.

The 17th regiment of line infantry, composed of reservists and conscripts, was on his orders transferred from Béziers to Agde on 18 June 1907.

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.

In the afternoon, after obtaining a guarantee that no sanctions will be imposed on them, the 17th soldiers put down their arms and marched to the station under escort, without any major incident.

Rail: The Gare de Béziers is a railway station with connections to Toulouse, Montpellier, Bordeaux, Marseille, Paris, Barcelona and several regional destinations.