In honor of the summer Olympics happening in Paris, we are going to dive into some dark Paris tourist history. It’s not the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, or even the spooky catacombs. At one point in history, the Paris Morgue was open to the public for the purpose of viewing the recently deceased in hopes of identifying unclaimed bodies. This quickly spiraled into one of the most popular attractions in Paris, even being listed in tourism guidebooks as “the best free theatre in Paris”.

References

Cain, T. (2015, June 1). Paris Morgue and a public spectacle of death. Retrieved from Wellcome Collection: https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/W-RTBBEAAO5mfQ3M

Magano, J., Fraiz-Brea, J. A., & Leite, A. (2022). Dark tourist: Profile, practices, motivations and wellbeing. Int J Environ Res Public Health, 19(19): 12100. .

Meuseum for Sepulchral Culture. (2023, July 30). The Unknown girl from the Seine. Retrieved from Meuseum for sepulchral culture: https://www.sepulkralmuseum.de/EN/research/library-collections/insights-into-our-collection/the-unknown-girl-from-the-seine

Scrivner, C. (2021). The psychology of morbid curiosity: Development and initial validation of the morbid curiosity scale. Elsevier Ltd, 183, Article 111139. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2021.111139.