Why did they dig the catacombs?

These tunnels were first excavated in the process of mining for various rock resources such as limestone and sandstone. These quarries became the basis for later excavation, first by the Romans for rock resources and then by the Christians and Jews for burial sites and mass graves.



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Some passages can be very low, narrow, or partially flooded. Because of these dangers, accessing the other parts of the Catacombs has been illegal since 2 November, 1955.

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Roman law at the time prohibited the burial of the deceased in the interior of the city, for which reason all of the catacombs were located outside of the walls. These separated and hidden places below ground constituted the perfect refuge in which the Christians could bury their own, freely using Christian symbols.

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At first, the catacombs were merely burial places; places where Christians could meet to perform funeral rites and celebrate the anniversaries of the martyrs and the dead. During the persecutions for the third century, Christians used the catacombs as places of momentary refuge for the celebration of the Eucharist.

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The Paris Catacombs have a fascinating history which dates back to ancient times, and is the final resting place of over 6 million Parisians.

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Like Rome, it has vast underlying passageways and quarries, called catacombs. This labyrinth of tunnels is thought to cover around 800 hectares — that's nearly 2,000 acres — beneath the city, though only a small part is explored and open to the public.

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In September 2004, French police discovered an underground movie theatre run by La Mexicaine De Perforation. The makeshift theatre contained a movie screen, a well stocked bar, and a kitchen. Telephones and electricity were brought in from an unknown location.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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Built in 1535, the Convent of San Francisco is a must-see for its beautiful Baroque-style architecture. The catacombs or crypts of Lima are considered the largest in the entire continent and also the best preserved. Its vast extension is only surpassed by the famous Catacombs of Paris.

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The beginning of the Catacombs were caused from the Bubonic Plague where there were too many bodies to bury. Over the course of Paris's history, there was so much death from disease and war that the cemeteries started to burst from the seams. The solution became burial tunnels which came to be the famous Catacombs.

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The main reason there are no bodies in these catacombs today is due to grave robbing. Not all robbers, however, were interested in hording worldly treasures. Since Christian martyrs were buried here, many early Christians went to these catacombs to collect relics from people who died for their faith.

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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 . ...

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