I wrote about the catacombs for a travel writing class I took in college and I went back and edited 5 different pieces together to make this. It’s a little different from my normal writing style, but I hope you like it.
Nothing was turning out the way I expected it to. We couldn’t find any restaurants we could afford, the workers at the Eiffel Tower were on strike, the sun had gone down, and it was bitingly cold. This wasn’t the Paris I was hoping for, and I was desperate for at least one thing to turn out right.
The last thing to try was the catacombs. We followed to map to where they were marked, but there was nothing there! After wandering into 3 different buildings, we were ready to give up, when Lucas saw an unlit, brown sign that said “les catacombes,” in small lettering.
We followed the sign, but all we saw was a dark, unlabeled shack with closed doors. It was late and I felt weird about just opening the door, but we were a bit desperate. We pushed the door open slowly and saw a snooty-looking woman at a desk.
Before we said anything at all she said “twenty-six Euro.”
Taken aback, Lucas asked in English, “is this the catacombs?”
“Oui.”
We handed over the money and took our tickets, and then looked up at her, waiting for some kind of instruction. Without looking up from her book, she pointed to a hole in the floor. Lucas and I looked at each other, shrugged, and headed down and onto a spiral stone staircase.
The air got steadily mustier as we went deeper down. There were bracketed lamps bolted intermittently to the walls, and wherever their light touched the stone, lamp flora was growing. When the stairs finally ended it let us out into a stone tunnel, completely empty, and dark except for one lamp.
At the end of this tunnel, there was a fork, and the oldest man I have ever met was sitting there in a folding chair. He didn’t speak, but pointed to the right. It felt haunted, like we weren’t supposed to be there.
We walked through the narrowing tunnel, getting closer and closer to the main entrance. We stopped in front of the archway to read the words etched there: Arrête! C’est ici l’empire de la mort. Lucas translated for me in a whisper saying “Stop! This is the empire of the dead.” The significance of the words struck me as we ducked our heads under the arch and stepped inside.
I love everything spooky, and I thought I knew what to expect, but no article could have prepared me for the sense of existential enlightenment I found there.
Walking between the bones of millions of unknown people made me feel incredibly small. Looking back, I think that most people don’t take the experience as seriously as I did, but then again, most people don’t get to experience it the way I did. The catacombs are usually packed with people. Most people only have the time to snap a few pictures before they’re rushed out to make room for more tourists. It’s rare to find yourself alone down there, with only the souls of those long dead to keep you company.
It was a little bit overwhelming for me to consider that many individuals as a whole. I felt drawn to them and wanted to be able to pay my respects in the same way you can in a modern cemetery.
I sat for a few minutes in front of just one skull. He was a person once, and I wanted to know him, but I knew I never could. This man (or woman) didn’t even get to be buried with his name. Thousands of people walk past him daily, but no one will ever be able to know anything about him. The last person he knew would have died hundreds of years ago, and his bones were dug out of an overcrowded cemetery and tossed together with countless others. I doubt any other tourists have ever even noticed this one person. How could they possibly? He has no distinguishing marks, and if you walked through the catacombs and spent even just a few minutes on each person, it would take you years to get through.
It made me sad for them, but it also helped me come to the realization that my own insignificance can be freeing. There are millions of people laid to rest within the miles of catacombs, billions of others who came before them in countries all over the world, and billions more alive today. I am just one person, not even a grain of sand on a beach in the big picture.
These men and women who lost their identities and individuality to be re-buried in a mass grave underneath the streets of Paris gave me the freedom to no longer care so much about what people think about me. I am free to live without fear of how I will be remembered, because in the scheme of things- it doesn’t really matter.
Nothing I do matters and no one will ever remember me. When I die I will end up a pile of bones, just like everyone else on the planet, and even then my bones won’t even get to be part of history. My bones won’t be displayed for tourists to gawk at, or for teenagers to deface. They’ll be put into a little wooden box, buried six feet under, and the only part of me anyone will ever see again will be a tombstone. Even then, they’ll probably only find it if they’re looking for it.
That freezing winter night, in the silent and empty catacombs, under a Paris bustling with Christmas shoppers, my outlook was completely changed.
If you want to read more about the catacombs and quarry tunnels under the streets of Paris, please check out this amazing National Geographic article and this one from Atlas Obscura.
And if you do go to Paris, I highly recommend prioritizing the catacombs. Its a wonderful experience and one that will stay with you forever.
Finding Eden 