The Paris Morgue

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by HunterRamirez

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The Paris Morgue was built in 1864 on the Île de la Cité, one of the two islands in the Seine, just behind the Notre Dame de Paris, where the bodies of unidentified dead–most of them suicide cases–were displayed on marble slabs for friends or family to identify.

When arriving at the morgue, the bodies were first stripped, inspected, frozen and then wheeled out on black marble slabs for public display. As the morgue was not refrigerated until 1882, cold water would drip from the ceiling constantly, giving the skin of the dead a bloated and puffy appearance. Up to 50 visitors at a time would crowd around great windows overlooking the slabs, to gawk and gossip over the bodies. The dead would usually have to be removed after three days due to decomposition, at which point a photograph or a wax cast would take their place.

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