Known as the first ever in the world, the Catacombs of San Sebastiano are a hypogeum cemetery in Rome, rising along Via Appia Antica in the Ardeatino Quarter. They are one of the few Christian burial locations that have always been accessible.
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A little history of the CatacombsThe Catacombs of Rome are underground galleries used for centuries as cemeteries. The catacombs began to take place in the 2nd century and were not finished until the 5th century. Here the pagan citizens, Jews and the first Christians of Rome were buried.
1. The Catacombs of Paris. Among the most famous catacombs in the world, the Paris Catacombs are underground quarries, housing approximately six million human skeletons.
In London's private Magnificent Seven cemeteries, opened between 1833 and 1841, there are several purpose-built catacombs, including those of West Norwood Cemetery, which has a collection of historic monuments on a landscaped hill.
In 1789, Paris, France, the world, the course of history was rocked by the French Revolution. From around this date, people were buried directly in the catacombs. This came to an end in 1860 when people ceased to be buried in the catacombs.
The city stopped moving bones into the ossuaries in 1860. Today, a little more than a mile of the catacombs is open for visitors to explore. The public entrance is located in Paris' 14th arrodissement, at 1, avenue du Colonel Henri Rol-Tanguy. It takes about 45 minutes to walk through.
Some areas of the tunnels even became shrines for martyrs buried there. But after Christianity was legalized in 313 AD, funerals moved above ground, and by the 5th Century, the use of catacombs as grave sites dwindled, though they were still revered as sacred sites where pilgrims would come to worship.
Researchers say that, due to the enormous dimensions, the catacombs will never be fully explored. Many areas are blocked or difficult to access. Moreover, the investigation requires special equipment and a well-trained team.
However, the strong smell of the Paris catacombs is apparently what all the initial signs were warning sensitive visitors about. At best, it could be likened to the dusty, incense-infused scent of old stone churches, but with an underlying malaise that can only be attributed to the contents of multiple cemeteries.
Even though it's illegal to access parts of the catacombs other than the site open to visitors, there's a group of urban explorers called “Cataphiles” who navigate the tunnels secretly.
The Catacombs of Paris is an underground ossuary in Paris that houses the remains of nearly six million people. Back in 1786, the entire underground population of Paris' cemeteries was relocated to quarry tunnels outside the city limits. Visitors can now explore the caverns and tunnels where the bodies were relocated.
We explored the catacombs with a guide from The Viking River Cruise Ship Sineus. During WWII Soviet partisans used the tunnels to hide from the Germans and to attack them. There were lots of relics on display as well as the remains of the partisan's living quarters.
Despite the ritual with which they were transferred, the bones had simply been dumped into the tunnels in large heaps. Slowly but surely the quarrymen lined the walls with tibias and femurs punctuated with skulls which form the basis of most of the decorations that tourists see today.
Among the many anonymous people who rest in the catacombs, there are some celebrities from French history such as Nicolas Fouquet (Louis XIV's superintendent of finance), Colbert, Rabelais, Jules Hardouin-Mansart, Racine, Blaise Pascal, Maral, Lully, Danton, Robespierre, Lavoisier but also the 1343 people guillotined ...
That year, a prolonged period of spring rain caused a wall around Les Innocents to collapse, spilling rotting corpses into a neighboring property. The city needed a better place to put its dead. So it went to the tunnels, moving bones from the cemeteries five stories underground into Paris' former quarries.