Page "Arc de Triomphe" Paragraph 17

Beneath the Arc is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from World War I. Interred here on Armistice Day 1920, it has the first eternal flame lit in Western and Eastern Europe since the Vestal Virgins ' fire was extinguished in the fourth century.

It burns in memory of the dead who were never identified ( now in both world wars ).

According to a 2008 television programme, presented by Griff Rhys Jones, “ the flame has only been extinguished once, by a drunken Mexican football supporter on the night that France beat Brazil here in Paris ,” most likely referring to the 1998 FIFA World Cup Final.