City
Reis Apollinaris
Riez
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Reis Apollinaris, today Riez in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, was the chief town of the Reii, a Celto-Ligurian people of southern Gaul. Its name marks it as the Reii's town of Apollo, here fittingly honoured as a god of healing. Under Augustus it became a Roman colony, governed by a board of four magistrates and served by a priest of Rome and the emperor. Inscriptions record cults of the Mother of the Gods, of Silvanus and of the healer Aesculapius, and the remains include baths and a temple that may have belonged to Apollo. From 434 the town was the seat of a bishop.