Le Cimetière de Père Lachaise

The Cemetery That Paris Tried to Ignore, Then Could Not Stop Visiting

When Père Lachaise opened in 1804, Parisians refused to use it. The site was too far from the city, the ground was not consecrated, and Roman Catholics were suspicious of a cemetery that had been designed by a civil architect rather than a priest. In its first years, it recorded barely 13 burials. The city’s solution was audacious: administrators arranged the transfer of the remains of Molière, Jean de La Fontaine, and, most dramatically, the medieval scholar Pierre Abélard and his lover Héloïse to the new cemetery, giving it an instant literary and romantic pedigree. Within a decade, burial plots at Père Lachaise became some of the most coveted real estate in Paris. That calculation has not changed in two hundred years.

Today, Père Lachaise is the largest cemetery in Paris, covering 44 hectares across the 20th arrondissement, and by visitor numbers it is the most visited cemetery on Earth. More than one million people are buried here. Walking through it on a weekday morning in spring, when the chestnut trees are in leaf and the light falls at low angles across the stone, it genuinely competes with the better-known Parisian museums for atmosphere.

The Graves Most Visitors Come For

Jim Morrison’s grave is the most famous and, on busy weekends, the most chaotic. The Doors singer died in Paris in July 1971 at age 27 and is buried in Division 6. For years the grave was a site of open-air parties, graffiti, and debris, and the city erected barriers around it after repeated vandalism. The stone marker itself is modest; what is less modest is the density of other visitors photographing it.

Oscar Wilde’s tomb, by contrast, is one of the most architecturally striking objects in the cemetery. Jacob Epstein sculpted it in 1912 as a winged sphinx in Portland stone, drawing on Egyptian and Assyrian forms. For decades visitors pressed lipstick kisses directly onto the stone, which caused significant erosion; a glass barrier now protects it and the kisses have migrated to the glass itself, which the management removes and replaces periodically.

Frédéric Chopin is in Division 11 beneath a marble portrait by Jean-Baptiste Clésinger, with his heart interred separately in Warsaw (a request in his will, on the grounds that he never felt fully at home in France). Édith Piaf rests in Division 97, her grave usually surrounded by flowers, and the proximity of her plot to her second husband Théo Sarapo three rows away is a fact the cemetery staff will point out if you ask.

The Graves That Deserve More Attention

Victor Noir, a journalist shot dead in 1870 by Prince Pierre Bonaparte after a dispute over a duel, is buried under a bronze effigy by Jules Dalou that depicts him lying exactly as he fell. The statue has developed a peculiar secondary fame: the cast bronze in the area of the statue’s trousers has been rubbed bright gold by the hands of visitors who believe the gesture brings fertility or romantic luck. The cemetery administration finds this embarrassing and periodically discusses relocation.

Allan Kardec, the 19th-century philosopher who codified the doctrine of spiritism, has the most flower-covered grave in the entire cemetery, regularly outnumbering the bouquets at Piaf’s plot. His followers, particularly from Brazil where spiritism has millions of adherents, travel specifically to visit the tomb. The legend holds that touching the back of Kardec’s bust and making a wish will cause it to come true, and the steady stream of visitors who treat this as genuinely true is one of the stranger sights the cemetery offers.

The Mur des Fédérés, the Communards’ Wall in the southeast corner of the cemetery, is a site of genuine historical gravity. In May 1871, 147 survivors of the Paris Commune were lined up against this wall, shot by government troops, and buried in a mass grave in front of it. The wall has been a site of political pilgrimage for the French left ever since, draped in red flags on May Day each year.

Guillaume Apollinaire, who coined the word “surrealism” and died in November 1918 of influenza two days before the Armistice, lies a few metres from his former lover Marie Laurencin, who asked to be buried with his letters to her placed on her heart. They are separated in death by the same few metres that separated them for most of their relationship.

Practical Information

Père Lachaise is free to enter every day. No tickets, no timed-entry slots, no booking required. Pick up a free map at the main entrance on Boulevard de Ménilmontant, or download one before you go, because the cemetery’s layout is genuinely confusing: the numbered divisions are not in obvious sequence, paths fork and dead-end, and the terrain rises and falls considerably. Without a map, finding a specific grave can take much longer than expected.

Hours run from 8:00 AM Monday to Friday, 8:30 AM Saturday, and 9:00 AM Sunday, closing at 6:00 PM from mid-March to early November and at 5:30 PM in winter. The last entry is fifteen minutes before closing. Guards begin circulation through the allées about twenty minutes before the gates shut.

Guided tours in English are available from several operators and run around two hours, typically costing between 15 and 25 euros per person. These are worth considering for a first visit specifically because the most interesting stories here are attached to graves that do not announce themselves visually, and the standard free map gives you locations but no context.

The nearest Metro stations are Père Lachaise (lines 2 and 3), Philippe Auguste (line 2), and Gambetta (line 3). From central Paris the journey takes roughly fifteen to twenty minutes. From Charles de Gaulle Airport, budget around an hour by RER B to Châtelet-Les Halles then Metro line 3 eastward, or around 45 euros by taxi.

Where to Eat Nearby

The 20th arrondissement around Belleville has a strong tradition of cheap, good food that survives gentrification better than most Paris neighbourhoods. The streets immediately east of the cemetery are full of small Vietnamese, Chinese, and North African restaurants where lunch rarely exceeds 12 euros. For something more specifically French, Le Baratin on Rue Jouye-Rouve is a small, neighbourhood bistro that has been cited in serious food press repeatedly for its honest cooking and very reasonable prices by Paris standards. Expect to spend around 20 to 30 euros for a full lunch.

If you want a more theatrical setting, Le Train Bleu inside the Gare de Lyon (about 25 minutes by Metro) is a Belle Époque dining room with painted ceilings and gilt mouldings that has operated since 1901. It is expensive by the standards of the area and the food is competent rather than exceptional, but the room itself is genuinely extraordinary and worth knowing about.

Where to Stay

Mama Shelter Paris East on Rue de Bagnolet is a ten-minute walk from the cemetery’s eastern entrance and is one of the better-value hotel options in this part of Paris, with a lively brasserie and bar on the ground floor. Rooms are functional and well-designed; rates typically fall in the 90 to 140 euro range depending on season. Hotel La Nouvelle Republique, near Place de la République and reachable by Metro in three stops, offers boutique-style rooms with a slightly more central position.

For visitors prioritising neighbourhood character over convenience, the 11th arrondissement immediately southwest of the cemetery is one of the more interesting places to stay in Paris: genuinely local, full of wine bars and natural food shops, and substantially cheaper per room than the Marais or Saint-Germain.

The Best Time to Visit

Saturday and Sunday afternoons between April and September bring the largest crowds, concentrated around the six or seven most famous graves. If you visit on a weekday, particularly in the morning, you can walk for extended periods through the older sections of the cemetery without passing another tourist. The less-visited eastern and northern divisions, which contain some of the most elaborate 19th-century mausolea, are essentially empty even on busy days.

The cemetery is at its most photogenic in autumn, when the chestnut and plane trees drop leaves across the flagstone paths and the light is low and warm from mid-morning onward. Spring brings flowers to many of the maintained plots and some of the more lavish private tombs become genuinely garden-like. The cemetery stays open through winter but closing at 5:30 PM means you lose the afternoon light entirely.

One logistical detail worth noting: the main entrance on Boulevard de Ménilmontant and the maps available there focus on the western section, where the most famous graves are clustered. The eastern section has its own gate on Rue de la Réunion and sees a fraction of the foot traffic. If you want to explore without a crowd at your heels, enter from the east.