Bazas Cathedral stands at the east end of a wide open space called the parvis in Bazas, Gironde. It is dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, because his blood was venerated there. Work began in the thirteenth century, mostly in the thirteenth and fourteenth, and the cathedral was completed in the eighteenth. The Gothic design was modeled on the great cathedrals of northern France.
The west front has three levels, with three Gothic portals that keep part of their thirteenth-century sculpture, a rose window from 1537 and a Neoclassical gable of 1723. The nave is long and narrow and has no transept.
Huguenots badly damaged the cathedral in 1561, and the interior was entirely rebuilt from 1583 to 1635. It was the seat of the Bishop of Bazas until the Revolution. It is a national monument and part of the UNESCO Routes of Santiago de Compostela in France.
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