BASTILLE DAY
Bastille Day is the name given in English-speaking countries to the French National Day, which is celebrated on the 14th of July each year.
Not in France! Here it is formally called La Fête Nationale (The National Celebration) and commonly Le quatorze juillet (the fourteenth of July).
It commemorates the 1790 Fête de la Fédération, held on the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789; the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille fortress-prison was seen as a symbol of the uprising of the modern nation, and of the reconciliation of all the French inside the constitutional monarchy which preceded the First Republic, during the French Revolution.
Of course festivities, fireworks and official ceremonies are held all over France.
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