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Thousands lined the streets of Paris yesterday for France's traditional Bastille Day parade, where troops in their finery marched down the tree-lined Champs-Elysees and jets trailing smoke of red, white and blue roared overhead.
Celebrated on July 14 each year, Bastille Day commemorates the 1789 storming of the Bastille - a Parisian jail which was mainly home to political prisoners - by French citizens disenchanted with the royal governance of the time.
The Bastille was regarded by the peasant class as a symbol of the corruption of the aristocratic government and its capture by the common people sparked the French Revolution.
Today, July 14 is a public holiday in France, with celebrations and parades held in every town and village across the country.
- NZ HERALD STAFF, AP
