BEAUCE

region, northwestern France. It stretches southwest of Paris toward the Fort d'Orlans. One of the great traditional granaries of France, Beauce is a flat, fertile, treeless limestone plain that was once planted mainly with wheat and sugar beets. Since the "Maize Revolution" of 1956, however, the countryside has been transformed-corn (maize), irrigated in the summer, now predominates. Petit Beauce is a similar section between the Loir and Loire rivers. Agriculture here is modern, completely mechanized, and yields very high production levels. The church spires, grain silos, and water towers of the market towns thrust vividly out of the unrelieved flatness. Chartres, Chteaudun, tampes, and Pithiviers are the main towns, all having agricultural markets.