The Bastille was the fortress-prison stormed in Paris on July 14, 1789, in a decisive early event of the French Revolution.
The Bastille, formally the Bastille Saint-Antoine, was built in the fourteenth century to defend Paris during the Hundred Years’ War. Later French monarchs used it as a state prison, especially for people detained by royal orders. Its imposing towers made it a potent symbol of absolute monarchy, even though only seven prisoners were held there when it fell.
Parisians attacked the fortress mainly to seize its stores of gunpowder and arms amid political crisis and fear of a royal military crackdown. After fighting, the garrison surrendered. The fortress governor, Bernard-René de Launay, was captured and killed by the crowd.
The storming became a revolutionary symbol rather than a major prison liberation. The Bastille was demolished soon afterward, and July 14 is now France’s national holiday, commemorating both the 1789 uprising and the Festival of the Federation held in 1790.