La Fete des Lumieres

Hello again, everyone!  It's been kind of a hectic past few weeks, and the time is really starting to get away from me, so I apologize for being a little negligent about my blogging.  Fortunately, I'm on Christmas vacation for the next two  weeks, so I've got a bit of time to catch up.

For this post, I'd like to talk about one of the biggest pre-Christmas celebrations in France- and one that I was lucky enough to see in person: Lyon's Fete des Lumieres (Festival of Lights).

On December 8th of every year, the entire city of Lyon lights up with artistic displays and animated spectacles.  The festival attracts over four million tourists annually, and it's easy to see why!  Light shows are planned months in advance to be absolutely breathtaking on the day of the festival.








Though the vast majority of the spectacles on display in Lyon are accomplished through modern technology, the Fete des Lumieres itself actually dates back to the Middle Ages, when France was struck by the bubonic plague.  The city officials and priests prayed to the Virgin Mary to spare Lyon from the disease, which she did.  In the following years, inhabitants of Lyon established a tradition of placing candles in their windows in early December, as a sign of gratitude.  Then, around the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the tradition began to grow into a true spectacle. Store owners put up displays using moving electric lights, and the festival has been growing every year since.  Today, the Fete des Lumieres exists not only in Lyon, but in many other major French cities as well.  Lyon, however, remains the cultural home of the festival of lights.