The caretaker of the Parisian cemetery “Père Lachaise” told about its secrets
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Caretaker of the famous French cemetery “Père Lachaise” Benoît Gallo dispelled urban myth about the fate of the stone testicles of the sphinx from the tombstone on the grave of the writer Oscar Wilde.
According to rumors, they were broken off from the statue by two British Puritans, who were shocked by their size. For a long time it was believed that they are located at the administration of the cemetery and serve as a paperweight for business papers. According to Galli, this story is pure fiction. He has no idea where the ill-fated testicles are now.
“Getting to work, I, of course, looked for this victim of castration in all the offices, rummaged through all the cabinets … I didn’t find anything; no trace of this “relic,” the caretaker admitted.
His job most often consists in escorting visitors to the resting place of celebrities: Chopin, Piaf, Balzac and others. Tourists very often get lost, so they have to hand out plans at the entrance to the churchyard. An application for smartphones is expected to be developed.
Pere Lachaise cemetery was opened in 1804. But it became famous after the repose of the wife of Henry III on it. After that, many high-ranking and famous French people were buried there. The musician Jimmy Morrison became a representative of the newest culture. But his admirers organized drinking parties with orgies so often that his grave was closed to the public.
Gallo also said that now the burial at the Pere Lachaise is more a matter of luck than money and power. The matter is that the term of lease of about 100 plots annually comes to an end. If you’re lucky, you can book one of them.
The caretaker of the cemetery is very sad about the lack of imagination among the relatives of the last generations of the dead. They can’t think of anything better than gray tombstones. Gallo called it “a disgrace bordering on a crisis”. If things go on like this, no one will want to visit the cemeteries.
Read also: “Will the mayor of Petrozavodsk be able to find the grave of the British engineer Gascoigne”
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