Beauvais

Beauvais is a town and commune in northern France, and prefecture of the Oise département, in the Hauts-de-France region, north of Paris. The commune of Beauvais had a population of 56,020 , making it the most populous town in the Oise department, and third most populous in Picardy. Together with its suburbs and satellite towns, the metropolitan area of Beauvais has a population of 128,020. The region around Beauvais is called the Beauvaisis. History Beauvais was known to the Romans by the Gallo-Roman name of Caesaromagus (magos is Common Celtic for "field"). The post-Renaissance Latin rendering is Bellovacum from the Belgic tribe the Bellovaci, whose capital it was. In the ninth century, it became a county (comté), which about 1013 passed to the bishops of Beauvais, who became peers of France from the twelfth century. At the coronations of kings, the Bishop of Beauvais wore the royal mantle and went, with the Bishop of Langres, to raise the king from his throne to present him to the people.