The End of the Cemetery

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In 1780 this cemetery that's been around for a thousand years is condemned. So people are yay we're done with this cemetery. There's like some definitely some outcry especially from the Catholic church who runs the cemetery. And so then they have an immediate problem right which is what do you do with a thousand years worth of bones and like human remains? Right that's like a that's a logistic problem. That's so many bones.

Let’s get spooky. Venture below Parisian streets and into the catacombs: hundreds of miles of subterranean tunnels housing millions of human skeletons, some fashioned into sculpture. Alie tracked down Dr. Erin-Marie Legacey – author of “Making Space for the Dead,” professor of French history and one of the world’s foremost experts on this eerie place. We chat about everything from miasmas to sinkholes, boggling cemetery history, smells, skulls, hidden chambers, (very) underground parties, and how we view our bodies post-life. Also: Alie takes a trip to see them herself.

Dr. Legacy’s book, “Making Space for the Dead: Catacombs, Cemeteries, and the Reimagining of Paris, 1780-1830” on Bookshop.org and Amazon

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A donation went to: Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas