The French franc ceased to be legal tender at midnight, after a send-off by the Minister of Finance, Mr Laurent Fabius, who invited 800 people to a sound and light show in the courtyard of his ministry at Bercy. Prime Minister Lionel Jospin was to attend the reception in honour of the businesses and associations who successfully organised France's transition to the euro.
In an article in the Journal de Dimanche, Mr Fabius called on consumers to be vigilant because the government's agreement with supermarkets and department stores to freeze prices was about to expire. Mr Fabius also reiterated his appeal for "a true economic council" to better co-ordinate economic policies within the euro zone.
Mr Fabius took advantage of the occasion to bring up an Irish bugbear: fiscal harmonisation. "I am favourable to our working more and more together with the other European countries, rather than engaging in fiscal competition which would weaken us all," he said.
The introduction of the euro has gone smoothly here, and 45 per cent of French people polled were pleased to have the new currency. Yet nearly the same number - 43 per cent - said they regretted the disappearance of the franc. They may be consoled to know that the Swiss franc, the CFA franc in Africa and the Pacific franc in New Caledonia and Polynesia survive.
After 641 years, it's not surprising that the French should feel a little nostalgic for their lost currency, which they owed to the British kidnapping of King Jean le Bon in 1356, in the midst of the Hundred Years War. To celebrate his freedom four years later, the King ordered the minting of the first "franc" - meaning "free" on December 5th, 1360. The coin bore the image of a horse and was the equivalent of the currency of the day, the Tours gold pound.
Between the late 16th and 18th centuries, the franc alternated with ecus, pounds, sous, deniers and louis. France's last big monetary reform was the switch from "old francs" to "new francs", whose nominal value was divided by 100 in 1960. Forty-two years later, some French people still talk in old francs.
A printer from Normandy named Olivier Bidou hopes to inaugurate a monument to the franc next Bastille Day; a 14-metre high sculpture made of three tricolour Concorde aircraft wings, with a giant one-franc coin suspended at the centre.
Franc notes are to be pulped and squeezed into bricks, or incinerated. The fate of eight billion franc coins is not yet certain. At 37,000 tonnes, they weigh as much as four Eiffel Towers.
The Banque de France says that only two thirds of its bank notes have been turned in. The French government hopes to pocket much of the outstanding €10.9 billion taken abroad by tourists or forgotten in drawers, clothing or mattresses.
