The rebellious leader claims that legionnaires marched on Boulevard Saint-Michel around the year 400.
While Paris has just experienced weeks of demonstrations against the pension reform, Jean-Luc Mélenchon believes that this is a long tradition. Before affirming during a colloquium of the Institut la Boétie on April 12: “Around the 400s, you had the first manifestation of antiquity: the Roman garrison was made up of Gallic soldiers who had been told that they had to go to the East. To be a legionnaire, yes, but not in the East; so they held a demonstration; they walked down boulevard Saint-Michel for the first time“. True or false ?
Mix of “true” and “false”
The specialist in Roman history, doctor of archaeologist, Clément Salviani, from the University of Le Havre produced a long thread on Twitter to detail and correct Jean-Luc Mélenchon. According to him, the politician is referring to an episode from the year 360 AD.
To put it simply, Roman legions were stationed in Lutèce (Paris) and certain legionnaires, who were not Romans, nor Gauls, received the order of their emperor to spin in the East to fight the Persians. Dissatisfied, they carried out a mutiny, a palace revolution, so that their own chief called Julien becomes emperor, and so that they escape the forwarding in the East.
On the other hand, historians have no trace of a parade, of a demonstration, on the axis of the current Boulevard Saint-Michel, even if a path existed at approximately the same place in the time of Lutèce. It is recalled that the boulevard Saint-Michel has been called like this since the 19th century.
First strike in Egypt
If there was no demonstration in the social sense of the term, the first social movements are however much older than the Roman era. We must go back to the 12th century BC.
In Egypt, the first documented strike in history, attested by a papyrus, took place at the site of the tomb of Ramses III in the Valley of the Kings. The workers were paid in food, but there were supply problems. The workers then ceased work with occupation of the site. Negotiations were initiated and the strikers reportedly won their case.