Riez (;

Provençal Provençal may refer to: *Of Provence, a region of France * Provençal dialect, a dialect of the Occitan language, spoken in the southeast of France *''Provençal'', meaning the whole Occitan language *Franco-Provençal language, a distinct Roman ...

: ''Riés'') is a commune in the

Alpes-de-Haute-Provence Alpes-de-Haute-Provence or sometimes abbreviated as AHP (; oc, Aups d'Auta Provença; ) is a department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of France, bordering Alpes-Maritimes and Italy to the east, Var to the south, Vaucluse to the west ...

department Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

in southeastern France.

Geography

The densely built village sits where two small rivers join—the Auvestre and the Colostre—in a glacially widened valley.

Population

Economy

Riez is located in a district of fields of commercially grown lavender, which support a honey-making industry.

Truffles A truffle is the fruiting body of a subterranean ascomycete fungus, predominantly one of the many species of the genus ''Tuber''. In addition to ''Tuber'', many other genera of fungi are classified as truffles including ''Geopora'', ''Peziza ...

are found: there is a weekly truffle market on Wednesdays from late November through March.

History

The domed hill was the hillfort headquarters of the Reii a

Celto-Ligurian The Ligures (singular Ligur; Italian language, Italian: liguri; English language, English: Ligurians) were an ancient people after whom Liguria, a region of present-day Northern Italy, north-western Italy, is named. Ancient Liguria cor ...

tribe, who gave their name to the Roman community in the valley floor near it: ''Alebaece Reiorum'' it was called, then ''Alebaece Reiorum Apollinares'' from the Roman temple of Apollo from which four

Corinthian columns The Corinthian order (Greek: Κορινθιακός ρυθμός, Latin: ''Ordo Corinthius'') is the last developed of the three principal classical orders of Ancient Greek architecture and Roman architecture. The other two are the Doric order w ...

yet stand. The name evolved to ''Regium'' (until the 8th century) then ''Regina'' (until the 11th century). A bishop of Riez is known from an early date, though the first bishop is purely legendary. At the beginning of the 5th century, a certain St. Prosper of Reggio in Emilia figures in the history of Riez and was perhaps its bishop; however, the first definitely known bishop, according to the ''Catholic Encyclopedia'', was St. Maximus (433–460), who succeeded St. Honoratus as Abbot of Lérins and who, in 439, held a council at Riez with a view to effecting ecclesiastical reforms in the churches of southern Gaul. His name is commemorated in the ''Mont St-Maxime'', which is surmounted by the ''Chapelle St-Maxim'' (a nunnery). His successor, St. Faustus of Riez (c. 461 – c. 493), also formerly Abbot of Lérins, was noted for his writings against

Predestinationists Predestination, in theology, is the doctrine that all events have been willed by God, usually with reference to the eventual fate of the individual soul. Explanations of predestination often seek to address the paradox of free will, whereby G ...

; it was to him that Sidonius Apollinaris dedicated his ''Carmen Eucharisticum'', in gratitude for hospitality received at Riez.

Contumeliosus of Riez Contumeliosus of Riez was a sixth century Bishop of Riez in Gaul. Pope John II deposed Contumeliosus in 534 for adulterous behaviour and authorized Caesarius of Arles to appoint a temporary bishop to the diocese. Contumeliosus' deposition is nota ...

was deposed for adultery in 534. At a much later date

Robert Ceneau The name Robert is an ancient Germanic given name, from Proto-Germanic "fame" and "bright" (''Hrōþiberhtaz''). Compare Old Dutch ''Robrecht'' and Old High German ''Hrodebert'' (a compound of '' Hruod'' ( non, Hróðr) "fame, glory, honou ...

(1530–1532), the pulpit orator afterwards Bishop of Avranches, and

Gui Bentivoglio Guido Bentivoglio d'Aragona (4 October 15797 September 1644) was an Italian cardinal, statesman and historian. Early years A member of the Ferrara branch of the influential Bentivoglio family of Bologna, he was the younger son of marchese Co ...

(1622–1625), the papal nuncio in France and a defender of French interests at Rome, who played an important role under Louis XIII, are also mentioned among the bishops of Riez. The diocese was suppressed on 29 November 1801, and its territory included in the diocese of Dignebr>
The 5th-century free-standing baptistery (its small dome rebuilt in the 12th century) is one of only a few surviving from

Christian Gaul Gaul was an important early center of Latin Christianity in late antiquity and the Merovingian period. By the middle of the 3rd century, there were several churches organized in Roman Gaul, and soon after the cessation of persecution the bishops of ...

; it was built about 100 meters from the healing waters that had been sacred to Aesculapius, son of Apollo, to whom a dedicatory inscription was found in the 17th century. In the Christianized landscape Riez retained its reputation for healing waters into the 19th centur

The former cathedral, located on the axis of the baptistery, was constructed on top of a much larger Roman public building from the 1st–2nd century; it was destroyed at the end of the 15th century. Excavations have revealed a 5th-century structure in the field across the road east of the baptistery. The present small cathedral is dedicated to Nôtre-Dame-de-l'Assomption. In the Middle Ages, the new structures of the town were gradually built away from the junction adjacent to the rivers to slightly higher ground because of a rising river. Alluvial silt deposited in the beds of the small rivers—a familiar result of deforestation in the rivers' upper watersheds—had raised the beds of the rivers and extended the floodplain. Deep alluvium still covers much of the Roman site of ''Reii Appolinares''.

Sites

Today the baptistery contains a small archaeological museum of altars and funerary

stele A stele ( ),Anglicized plural steles ( ); Greek plural stelai ( ), from Greek , ''stēlē''. The Greek plural is written , ''stēlai'', but this is only rarely encountered in English. or occasionally stela (plural ''stelas'' or ''stelæ''), whe ...

s and a collection of Roman inscriptions, which include an inscribed ''

taurobolium In the Roman Empire of the second to fourth centuries, ''taurobolium'' referred to practices involving the sacrifice of a bull, which after mid-second century became connected with the worship of the Great Mother of the Gods; though not previo ...

'' altar.It was noted ''in situ'' across from the cathedral, by Aubin Louis Millin, ''Voyage dans Les Départemens du Midi de la France'', vol. iii:49. There is a cylindrical milestone from the

Aurelian Way The ''Via Aurelia'' (Latin for "Aurelian Way") is a Roman road in Italy constructed in approximately 241 BC. The project was undertaken by Gaius Aurelius Cotta, who at that time was censor.Hornblower, Simon, & Antony Spawforth. ''The Oxford C ...

. In the '' Hôtel de ville'' is the Natural History Museum of Provence.

References

''Catholic Encyclopedia'':
"Digne"
Richard Stillwell, ed. ''Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites'', 1976:
"Alebaece Reiorum Apollinarium (Riez) Alpes de Haute-Provence, France"

External links

Town's website
{{authority control Communes of Alpes-de-Haute-Provence Alpes-de-Haute-Provence communes articles needing translation from French Wikipedia