Making Space for the Dead: Catacombs, Cemeteries, and the Reimagining of Paris, 1780–1830

229 Pages·2019·12.571 MB·English

by  Erin-Marie Legacey

Making Space for the Dead

Making Space
for the Dead
Catacombs, Cemeteries, and the
Reimagining of Paris, 1780–1830
Erin-Marie Legacey
Cornell University Press
Ithaca and London
Copyright © 2019 by Cornell University

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First published 2019 by Cornell University Press

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Legacey, Erin-Marie, 1979– author.
Title: Making space for the dead : catacombs, cemeteries, and the
reimagining of Paris, 1780–1830 / Erin-Marie Legacey.
Description: Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2019. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2018042962 (print) | LCCN 2018046294 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781501715617 (pdf) | ISBN 9781501715600 (epub/mobi) |
ISBN 9781501715594 | ISBN 9781501715594 (cloth : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Burial—Social aspects—France—Paris—History—
18th century. | Burial—Social aspects—France—Paris—History—
19th century. | Pere-Lachaise (Cemetery : Paris, France)—History. |
Catacombs—France—Paris—History. | Paris (France)—Social life and
customs—18th century. | Paris (France)—Social life and customs—
19th century. | France—History—Revolution, 1789–1799—Infl uence.
Classifi cation: LCC GT3249.P37 (ebook) | LCC GT3249.P37 L44
2019 (print) | DDC 393/.10944361—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018042962

Cover illustration: View in the Catacombs, 1861. Albumen silver print
by Nadar [Gaspard-Félix Tournachon]. The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los
Angeles. Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.
For my dad

Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xi
List of Abbreviations xv
Introduction: The Revolution of the Dead 1
1. The Problem of the Dead 17
In which the French Revolution interrupts and intervenes
in Paris’s preexisting burial crisis.
2. The Solution of the Dead 44
In which a range of experts and amateurs imagine
a new burial culture for Paris after the Terror.
3. The City of the Dead 71
In which Parisians visit and respond to their city’s new
burial space, Père Lachaise Cemetery.
4. The Empire of the Dead 99
In which thousands of visitors descend ninety feet below
the city to tour the newly opened Paris Catacombs.
viii Contents
5. The Museum of the Dead 124
In which the artist and administrator Alexandre Lenoir
displays the dead as history in the Museum
of French Monuments.
Conclusion: The Historian of the Dead 153
In which the Romantic historian Jules Michelet resurrects
the history of France in Parisian spaces for the dead.
Notes 161
Bibliography 187
Index 203
Illustrations
1.1 The Cemetery of the Innocents in 1786 18
1.2 Mirabeau’s tomb in the Panthéon 26
1.3 The statue of death in the Cemetery of the Innocents 28
1.4 The remains of Henri IV, exhumed in 1793 34
2.1 Cross-section and design of Pierre Giraud’s Champ de repos 66
2.2 Perspective view of Pierre Giraud’s Champ de repos 67
3.1 Père Lachaise Cemetery in 1856 75
3.2 Tomb of Antoine Lagrange in Père Lachaise Cemetery 90
4.1 The fi nal gallery of the Paris Catacombs in 1861 100
4.2 The monument to the September Massacres in the
Paris Catacombs in 1861 108
4.3 Dramatic views of the Paris Catacombs in 1823 113
5.1 Alexandre Lenoir defending the royal tombs
from destruction 130