PÈRE LACHAISE

Description

Essentials about Père Lachaise in brief

A cemetery as a place of interest? What may sound a little strange, belongs in the visiting program of every trip to Paris. The reason being, the cemetery of Père Lachaise is not only the largest cemetery in Paris and the first burial place in the world laid out as a park cemetery. Due to its beautiful grounds and the many graves of famous personalities, Père Lachaise is probably also the most famous and most visited cemetery in the world. Around 3.5 million people visit it every year.

The history of Père Lachaise

At the beginning of the 19th century, several new cemeteries had to replace the old ones in Paris. In order to end the primacy of the church for burial, an edict was issued in 1803 according to which burial grounds could no longer be established as churchyards within the city limits in the future, but were to be placed under the supervision of the political community and established outside the city. In accordance with this principle, in 1803 an extensive garden area in the east of Paris, outside the city limits at the time, was completely redesigned and enlarged. Despite this secular concept, the cemetery was named after Louis XIV’s confessor, the Jesuit priest François d’Aix de Lachaise, who lived on the site for some time.

The tombs of Père Lachaise

The cemetery is now a maze of a few large, wide avenues and many small paths, some hidden, winding up hills. The graves at Père Lachaise take a wide variety of forms. From the monumental marble and granite family mausoleum to the poor single stone grave, every form of final resting place is represented. The most striking structure of the cemetery is the huge crematorium, which is still in operation today. After cremation, the ashes of the deceased are scattered on marked meadows around the crematorium.

For tourists, the main reason for a visit is the multitude of personalities buried at Père Lachaise, such as the writer Honoré de Balzac, the composer Georges Bizet, the opera singer Maria Callas, the pianist and composer Frédéric Chopin, the mathematician and physicist Laplace, the actor and playwright Molière, the chansonnier and actor Yves Montand, the singer and songwriter Jim Morrisson, the singer Édith Piaf, the actress and writer Simone Signoret and the writer Oscar Wilde (to name just a few).