2 days ago
- Science
- National Geographic
200 years ago, tourists flocked to Paris—to see decomposing corpses
In 1870s Paris, expensive plate glass panes meant one of two things: high-end shopping or public spectacle. At la Morgue de Paris, it meant both.
Inside, the city's unclaimed dead lay on tilted marble slabs beneath a trickle of water meant to stave off decay. While some still wore the clothes they were found in, most were naked, with only leather loincloths placed over their genitals. Other garments—coats, boots, even umbrellas—were hung above or beside the body, displayed like clues in a grim shop window. If a corpse had decomposed too far, attendants would swap in a wax replica to keep the body presentable for viewing.
Crowds gathered daily at the giant glass façade. Vendors hawked oranges and waffles to the waiting. Tourists consulted guidebooks listing the morgue alongside Notre Dame. Families brought children. Parisians came not to grieve— but to gawk.
The morgue had been intended as a forensic tool to help identify the city's unknown dead. Instead, it became Paris's most macabre attraction.
'One of the journalists said when [the Paris Morgue] closed in 1907 that it was the first free theater for the people,' says Vanessa Schwartz, an art history professor and director of the Visual Studies Research Institute at the University of Southern California. But it was also a site of real forensic innovation.
