European vacation: We visit Père Lachaise cemetery

To celebrate the promise and refreshed expectations of the new year, 2025 we took a trip to the Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.  It’s the largest cemetery in the French capital, at 110 acres and 70,000 burial plots. It’s widely regarded as a place to go for a walk, rather than a place to contemplate the brevity of life’s brief candle-flame and indeed it is a fine place for a stroll. (Although it was raining and pretty darn cold.)

Père Lachaise cemetery

One notable aspect of Père Lachaise is its neatness. Every body has a nice rectangular plot, often a little mausoleum with a roof, a window and a place for flowers and remembrances. The grass is neatly cut and the paths laid out for walkers.  Only a few areas have the tumbledown look of Highgate (of which more later) and if it weren’t for the thick beds of moss on the horizontal stone surfaces, it would look newly built.

Rare disarray in Père Lachaise

A wide variety of people are buried here, and the one that most Americans will recognize is Jim Morrison, the singer with 60s rock band The Doors who died heartbreakingly young.  We visited that gravesite – and so did everyone else, it seems. It’s been cordoned off with tape (perhaps to keep people from trampling nearby plots) but fans have left piles of flowers and souvenirs on the stone. Perhaps ten or fifteen people visited in the short time we attended, which you can’t say about Chopin, who is also there. (Though he also has fresh flowers.)

Chopin

Jim Morrison's grave

I was delighted to visit Champollion, a giant in Egyptology and one of the pioneers in reading and understanding Egyptian hieroglyphs. His tomb is marked by an obelisk, of course.  Oscar Wilde is there with a very fancy carved grave marker, sadly covered in Perspex to prevent people from leaving graffiti on the stone. The mathematician Fourier is buried there as well. The old bust that used to mark his grave had lost its nose and was widely believed to be a bust of Voldemort, so it was replaced with a new bronze bust not long ago.  His grave is also marked by an Egyptological flourish – a sun disk with two vulture wings. Paris was Egypt mad at the time. (Even more so than London.)  Another scientist buried there is Fresnel, an optics pioneer.

Oscar Wilde's marker

Oscar Wilde's marker, three quarter view

Champollion's Obelisk, Père Lachaise

Fourier's grave with verdigris bust

Fresnel's grave and headstone

I’m not sure what Miguel Asturias did to deserve a faithful copy of a Mayan stela, but it’s certainly a beautiful sight. It seems perfectly situated, a little bit of ancient Guatemalan jungle realized in Paris.

Mayan stele at Pere Lachaise

There is also a crematorium onsite with thousands of pigeonholes in a structure known as a columbarium. After a long search, we found Max Ernst’s final resting place. I guess he didn’t want a grave and a mausoleum, or indeed any fuss.  Hi Max, anyway.  

Max Ernst, in the columbarium

I picked up a conker (horse chestnut) from the grounds and I’ve put it with my conker from Golder’s Green Crematorium, which I took with me when I went to visit Marc Bolan and Paul Kossoff, many years ago.

Next: Continuing our quest to celebrate the possibilities of the brand new year, we visit Highgate Cemetery in London!