History
Around 600 BC, Greeks settled in Bessan on the oppidum of Monadière to trade.
In 218 BC Hannibal, Carthaginian general, crossed the region with his army and war elephants to attack the Romans, passing between Bessan and Montblanc.
In 408-409 AD Béziers, Agde and the region were ransacked by an army of Germans (Burgundians, Suevi, Vandals), Slavs (Alain) and other tribes.
In 737, Charles Martel entered the province at the head of the French, temporarily pushing the Saracens, destroying Béziers, Agde and the surrounding countryside so that they could not return to fortify them.
To 1050-1100, building began of the fortified village of Bessan.
In 1209, the Crusader army, led by Simon de Montfort, seized the region under the pretext of hunting the Cathars, and ten years later the castles of Bessan and Touroulle and become the property of his son Amaury.
In 1278, the Bessans had already obtained from their seigneur the right to elect consuls (mayors) to deal with political affairs.
In 1348, plague killed a large proportion of the population. It returned several times thereafter.
On the 30 October 1587, Antoine Scipio, the new Duke of Joyeuse and leader of the Catholics, took advantage of the governor of Languedoc's absence in the Tarn with his army, seized and looted Bessan.
In 1851, during the coup of Napoleon III, a cannon was pointed at the Grand'rue and thirty republic Bessanais were deported.
In 1907, the Bessanais were actively involved in the Midi wine revolt.
In November 1942, German troops entered and occupied Bessan. They fled in August 1944, after the Allied landing in Provence.
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