Catacombs of Paris

The Catacombs of Paris, known in French as Les Catacombes de Paris, are a vast underground ossuary beneath the 14th arrondissement of Paris, with the public entrance at Place Denfert-Rochereau. The galleries were originally limestone quarries, part of an extensive network excavated beneath the city to provide building stone for Paris. By the late eighteenth century, overcrowded and increasingly unsanitary cemeteries had become a serious public-health problem, particularly the ancient Saints-Innocents Cemetery in the city centre. Beginning in 1785, human remains were removed from these cemeteries and transported at night to the abandoned Tombe-Issoire quarries. The underground site was consecrated as the Paris Municipal Ossuary on 7 April 1786 and became known as the Catacombs in reference to the ancient catacombs of Rome. Transfers continued from other Paris cemeteries until 1814 and resumed during later nineteenth-century redevelopment, with the final deposits made during the Haussmann transformations around 1860. Inspector Louis-Étienne Héricart de Thury reorganised the ossuary between 1810 and 1814, arranging skulls, femurs and tibias into the distinctive decorative walls seen today and adding monuments, inscriptions and quotations intended to encourage reflection on death. The Catacombs contain the remains of several million Parisians, commonly estimated at around six million. They lie approximately 20 metres below street level, while the official visitor route extends for about 1.5 kilometres through a much larger underground quarry system. The name Catacombs of Paris technically refers to the section converted into an ossuary rather than the entire network of subterranean quarries beneath the city.

The Catacombs of Paris have appeared in As Above, So Below (2014) and The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon (2023–). As Above, So Below (2014) was the first feature film granted extensive official permission to shoot inside both public and normally inaccessible sections of the real catacombs, spending around five weeks underground during production. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon (2023–) later received permission to film in the real ossuary on days when it was closed to visitors, using the bone-lined galleries as the route leading to the underground Demimonde nightclub. Both productions also supplemented the genuine location with purpose-built sets when scenes required environments, stunts or action that could not safely be created among the historic human remains.

In As Above, So Below (2014), archaeologist Scarlett Marlowe becomes convinced that the legendary philosopher’s stone of Nicolas Flamel is hidden deep beneath Paris. Together with cameraman Benji and her friend George, she recruits local cataphile Papillon, his girlfriend Souxie and their companion Zed to guide them into a restricted section of the Catacombs. Their expedition begins in recognisable quarry passages and bone-lined galleries before they are forced through a tunnel that Papillon has deliberately avoided since his friend La Taupe disappeared there. As they descend, apparently impossible elements begin appearing around them, including Papillon’s own markings in places he claims never to have visited, a piano identical to one from George’s childhood and eventually La Taupe himself. The group discovers a hidden tomb, treasure and what Scarlett believes to be the philosopher’s stone, but their attempt to escape instead takes them deeper into an increasingly supernatural reflection of the Catacombs. Individual members are confronted by manifestations of their guilt and past actions, while the route gradually takes on the characteristics of a descent through Dante’s Hell. Much of this material was filmed inside the genuine Paris Catacombs rather than a conventional horror set. Director John Erick Dowdle and his crew worked underground for approximately five weeks, often with the actors’ headlamps providing much of the visible light. There was no mobile-phone reception and conventional wireless equipment was unreliable, while the cramped passages required a reduced crew and lightweight cameras, including cameras carried by the performers themselves. More elaborate sections, including parts of the hidden chamber and underwater material, were recreated on a soundstage. The result allows the real quarry passages, low ceilings and walls constructed from human bones to provide much of the film’s physical claustrophobia before the story moves beyond anything that actually exists beneath Paris.

In The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon (2023–), the Catacombs of Paris first appear prominently in the first-season episode «Paris Sera Toujours Paris» (2023). After Daryl Dixon, Isabelle, Laurent and Sylvie reach Paris, they meet Fallou Boukar and his community. Daryl is still searching for a way back to the United States, and Fallou offers to take the group to a place where almost anything can be traded or arranged. He leads them underground through the Catacombs, where they surrender their weapons before walking among the walls of skulls and bones. Fallou tells Daryl that Paris has survived earlier catastrophes and uses the ancient remains surrounding them as evidence that people will survive this apocalypse as well. Their destination is the Demimonde, a flamboyant underground nightclub operated by Quinn, Isabelle’s former lover and, as she soon discovers, Laurent’s biological father. The Catacombs return in «La Dame de Fer» (2023), when Daryl uses another route through the tunnels to enter the Demimonde after Laurent is taken by Quinn’s men, and escapes through the underground passages with the boy after rescuing him. The location is used again in the second season, particularly in «Vouloir, C’est Pouvoir» (2024), when Daryl, Laurent and Codron retreat into the Catacombs while being pursued by Losang and his followers. Daryl and Codron use the darkness and narrow passages to ambush their pursuers before Daryl fights Losang among the bones. Production for the series was granted rare access to the real Catacombs, with filming restricted largely to Mondays when the site was closed to visitors. Equipment and crew had to be carried down roughly 130 steps, and the number of people underground was tightly limited. The genuine galleries were used for the quieter passages through the ossuary and the approach to the Demimonde, while major combat sequences were recreated on a studio set modelled closely on the real tunnels to avoid damaging the fragile historic site.

---