Pere Lachaise Cemetery description and photos - France: Paris (Topic)

Pere Lachaise Cemetery description and photos - France: Paris. Detailed information about the attraction. Description, photographs and a map showing the nearest significant objects. The title in English is Pere Lachaise Cemetery.

Photo and description

Pere Lachaise is the largest cemetery in Paris. The ashes of famous scientists, writers and artists, military men and politicians rest here.

Now Pere Lachaise is one of the most famous burial places in the world. In the Middle Ages, here, on the outskirts of the capital, lay a poor criminal district. Then a monastery appeared. The land became the property of the Jesuit order, one of which was the confessor of Louis XIV, Francois de la Chaise. The name of the cemetery (Pere Lashaise) literally translates as “Father la Chaise.”

The land here was acquired by the city in 1804. At first, the Parisians did not want to bury their relatives in such a wilderness. The authorities took an unconventional step: they reburied the remains of La Fontaine, Moliere, Abelard and his student Eloise here. This gave a result - the cemetery became prestigious.

In 1814, the troops of the anti-Napoleonic coalition entered Paris. The youth tried to block their path with barricades. On Pere Lachaise, the cadets of the military school resisted the Russians. The Cossacks stabbed them with bayonets and set up their camp in the cemetery.

Today, more than one million dead, including celebrities, are buried on Pere Lachaise. More than two million people visit the cemetery every year. It is extremely interesting to wander here, but it should be remembered that the cemetery has an amazingly chaotic layout. Some of the graves can be difficult to find.

Among the famous burials is the Wall of the Communards: the last soldiers of the Paris Commune were shot at it. In 2005, a monument to Russian participants in the French Resistance was erected on Pere Lachaise. Here are buried Napoleonic marshals Massena, Murat and Ney, the genius Egyptologist Jean-Francois Champollion, the great Beaumarchais, Balzac and La Fontaine, the composer Georges Bizet and the American from The Doors Jimmy Morrison, the great Parisian "sparrow" Edith Piaf ...

The famous Russians also rest on Pere Lachaise: Decembrist Turgenev, Princess Trubetskaya, Demidovs. In the local columbarium there are urns with the ashes of Sergei Yesenin and Nestor Makhno. Entrance to the territory is free and free.

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Topic: Pere Lachaise Cemetery description and photos - France: Paris.