The Communist leaders addressed the rally from a rostrum mounted near the monument to Karl Marx and greeted them, chanting "long live great October!" "long live the great October socialist revolution!"
Leader of the Communist Party of Russia (KPRF) Gennady Zyuganov urged the rally to support his party at the elections to the Moscow City Duma. KPRF Deputy Chairman Ivan Melnikov said earlier that the action was festive and was intended to show the number of KPRF supporters in Moscow.
"This is a great holiday for us because we believe that November 7 ushered in a new life and a new epoch. But this holiday is also important for us to show that we have many supporters in the city," Melnikov said.
The Bolshevik Revolution was also remembered in other cities of Russia. About 5,000 communists rallied at the Mars Field in St. Petersburg.
"The majority of the protesters were elderly people, but youth were unusually active, as well," said Sergei Malinkovich, the leader of the Communists of St. Petersburg.
More than 300 members of the Communist Party, the Rodina Party and the National-Bolshevik Party gathered at a meeting commemorating the 88th anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution in Irkutsk in East Siberia. The participants protested a possible reburial of Lenin's body and the social reforms of the Russian government.
About 500 pensioners marched on the streets of Nizhny Novgorod in central Russia protesting the government reforms of communal services and other social spheres.
In Soviet times, November 7 was the main public holiday commemorating the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. Celebrations under communism involved huge military parades and demonstrations observed by Soviet leaders on Lenin's mausoleum on Red Square.
After the collapse of communism, November 7 was renamed National Reconciliation Day, but was only celebrated by hard-line communists, who continued to mark it by marching on the streets under red banners.
In 2004, the Russian parliament replaced National Reconciliation Day with National Unity Day on November 4 to commemorate the liberation of Moscow from Polish troops in 1612, which ended decades of civil war and foreign intervention in Russia.
