France’s ‘patriotic’ banquets rile hard left

De Boisse says they are merely reviving an old French tradition of dining en masse with good local fare that goes back into the depths of medieval history. After the French Revolution, which led to the abolition of the monarchy, there were banquets républicains – marking the arrival of the new system – and, until recently, every village used to have its annual banquet populaire – a kind of people’s feast.