2024 Author: Adelina Croftoon | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-01-11 14:44
Among other attractions there is a museum in Paris, where only people with good health are allowed. If you have problems with the heart, respiratory tract or you are overly impressionable - enter Paris catacombs closed to you.
City over the void
Even the Roman legions brought with them to the banks of the Seine a fashion for buildings made of stone, which looked much more representative than wooden ones, and in addition, remained intact for many centuries. And the deposits of limestone suitable for construction turned out to be solid in those places - they could be enough for more than one generation of architects. The first quarries appeared on the site of present-day Paris in the 6th century BC, they were open, there they mined the rock that came out directly to the surface.
Since the Middle Ages, the country's need for materials for stone buildings has increased many times, and with it the extraction of limestone has steadily expanded. For two or three centuries, Paris was decorated with castles, monasteries and cathedrals, for example, the famous Notre Dame de Paris and the first buildings of the Louvre. A stone was also needed for the construction of protective ramparts around the city, and therefore deeper tunnels began to be dug for its extraction. By the 15th century, the old principles of stone mining were completely outdated, they were replaced by new ones.
The rock was already developed on two tiers, and the quarries acquired the lower floor, which gradually turned into an extensive network of dungeons. Wells with winches were built near the exits from the underground tier, through which the lime blocks were raised to the surface. At this time and the next couple of centuries, the residential part of Paris increased so much that the quarries were in the city limits and many areas of the city actually hovered over the void.
Many kilometers of workings stretched under the Parisian streets and squares, systematically causing the soil to collapse. It was said that parts of the streets sometimes disappeared underground, together with passers-by and carriages, or houses with all residents.
At first, they tried to solve the problem with one-time work to strengthen the dungeons, but while the walls and arches of the catacombs were being strengthened in one part of the city, new collapses occurred in the other. Limestone mining was completely stopped, but this did not help either.
By the 18th century, the problem was so acute that King Louis XVI ordered the creation of a General Inspectorate of Quarries, whose duties included the systematic work of drawing up a complete plan of the underground galleries and taking constant measures to strengthen them. The inspectorate got down to business thoroughly and fairly successfully, and it has survived to this day and now performs its functions in modern Paris.
The dead - under the ground
Along with the improvement of the quarries, they found a new use. By the middle of the 18th century, the question of the monstrous overcrowding of city cemeteries arose in Paris. The fact is that since the early Middle Ages, burials of the deceased have traditionally been carried out around churches. Several centuries later, the place ended, but the priests did not want to "release" the bodies of the newly departed from the territory where it was possible to earn money on them.
In the cemetery of the Innocents alone, the dead from 19 parishes were buried, and in the end their number exceeded two million. The burials went to a depth of up to ten meters, and the upper level of the cemetery ground towered a couple of meters above the Parisian streets.
In some places, human remains were visible from the ground. The decaying corpses exuded a terrible stench, brought infectious diseases to the Parisians, it came to the point that in the neighboring houses the hostesses sour milk and wine from the rotten air. The Cemetery of the Innocents and other city graveyards slowly but surely turned into a serious danger to the inhabitants.
Finally, one tragic incident radically changed the cemetery history of Paris. The wall collapsed, at least partially protecting the nearest rue de la Lanjri from the cemetery. The basements of the houses were instantly filled with half-decayed corpses, earth and dirt, so the authorities had to urgently ban any burial in the city. Soon it was decided to use abandoned underground quarries for storing the remains.
For the next 15 months, carts covered with mourning cloth transported mountains of bones to their future underground refuge. In order to streamline the rapidly expanding city of the dead, the galleries were given the same names that were worn by the streets of Paris passing over them.
It should be noted that no one even tried to identify the piles of human remains, since then most of them have become nameless. Only the names of the most famous "inhabitants" of the underground burial ground are known. At different times in the catacombs were the remains of the ministers of the "sun king" Fouquet and Colbert, the "sons of the revolution" Robespierre and Danton, writers Rabelais and Perrault. The bones were taken to the catacombs for almost a century, thus clearing 17 city cemeteries.
Legends and secrets of the empire of the dead
However, even before the Parisian dungeons became the last refuge of millions of the dead, their own ghosts began to settle there. In the 17th century, the catacombs acquired the ghosts of young lovers. Henri was the son of noble parents, and Margarita was born into a poor family, but this did not prevent them from falling in love with each other.
The young man's family, of course, was shocked by his choice and forbade him to meet with the girl. Then the lovers secretly got married and set out to flee France, and in anticipation of their escape they hid in the catacombs.
However, a tragic accident cut short their lives: a collapse occurred in the dungeon, and the young couple was walled up in one of the passages. In memory of the fallen lovers, a sculpture depicting their dying embrace is installed near the alleged place of their death. Visitors say that near the monument, from behind the wall, you can sometimes hear the crying of a girl and the prayer of her beloved.
A little later, a mysterious creature appeared in the underground passages. It always appeared unexpectedly, as if it were growing out of the ground, and just as quickly, with lightning speed, it disappeared. The police were never able to compile an intelligible description of the mysterious monster from the catacombs, especially since many eyewitnesses stated that most of all it looked like an ethereal shadow from which cold and the smell of decay spread.
Parisians inclined to mysticism argued that most of those who met the monster face to face disappeared forever in the darkness of the underground galleries. In fact, people who got lost were almost never found there - the network of passages was too long and confusing. For example, the church watchman, who decided to borrow a bottle of wine from the underground monastery storage, was found only 11 years later, ironically, very close to the entrance to the catacombs.
Around the places where there were exits from the dungeons to the top, various mysterious incidents also constantly took place. One story was published by reporters in a Parisian newspaper in the middle of the 19th century. The house of the venerable wood seller, located next to the working platform for laying new streets over the catacombs, was subjected to a grandiose "shelling" every night with solid blocks of limestone.
As a result, the structure looked as if some unknown giant had declared war on it: the doors and windows were knocked out, the walls were covered with cracks, and the roof was covered with holes. The police were guarding the intruders for several weeks, but they could not arrest anyone.
Lovers of Parisian secrets saw in this mysterious case the anger of the dead from the dungeons, disturbed by the construction, but not a single confirmation of the mystical theory was ever found. And the stone shelling stopped one day as suddenly as it began.
Today is the day of "lower Paris"
Practical Frenchmen constantly tried to add huge underground territories to business. At various times in "lower Paris" they tried to breed champignons, brew beer, store wine, arrange concert halls and drinking establishments for extreme lovers. Napoleon III sometimes liked to overtake fear on his guests, walking with them through the catacombs. Centuries have passed, but something still attracts people to underground passages and galleries.
The total length of the undergrounds is up to 300 kilometers, and only a small section of two kilometers is open for tourists to visit. Law-abiding citizens are satisfied with this, but there are also brave people who want to travel underground without restrictions.
Lovers and connoisseurs of the history of underground Paris - cataphiles - go on walks through the catacombs, armed with detailed maps, powerful flashlights and other useful equipment. Therefore, no danger usually threatens them. “Spontaneous tourists” also roam underground, wishing to look at the wonders of the city's dungeons from those that are closed for official excursions.
These individuals, poorly prepared for trekking underground, are subject to various dangers: they can easily get lost, fall into a landslide or fall into an underground well. Cataphiles treat such amateurs with a fair amount of skepticism and, on occasion, play them off, leaving them in complete darkness for a long time without any reference.
But no matter how many enthusiasts roam the endless dungeons, the catacombs of the French capital continue to jealously guard their secrets from prying eyes. And no one knows how many of them are still hiding in the darkness of the underground galleries.
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