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Paris city hall is offering a rare chance to be buried among some of history’s most celebrated artists. All it will take is a bit of luck, a few thousand euros and a desire to dust off a dilapidated tombstone.
Wednesday was the deadline to register for a draw to purchase a burial spot in one of the city’s iconic cemeteries.
Winners will get the chance to restore a forgotten and overgrown grave.
In return for the restoration work, they will be able to buy the rights to a burial plot in the cemetery.
Paris cemeteries a draw for visitors
Père-Lachaise Cemetery is one of the most iconic burial sites in Paris — and one of the most famous cemeteries in the world. Along with Montmartre in the north and Montparnasse in the south, it’s one of the three major cemeteries in the city.
Some of the celebrated names interred at Père-Lachaise include playwright Oscar Wilde, Doors singer Jim Morrison and composer Frédéric Chopin.
Cobbled lanes wind around the cemetery, with approximately 70,000 graves set on a hill in eastern Paris, which draws tourists as well as mourners — more than three million people visit the graveyard every year.
Among those buried in Montparnasse Cemetery are the writers Jean-Paul Sartre and Susan Sontag.
Painter Edgar Degas and author Émile Zola are interred in Montmartre Cemetery.
City authorities have identified 30 graves in need of repair — 10 in each of the three graveyards.
Burial space at a premium in Paris
In Paris, the families of the dead — rather than city authorities — are responsible for maintaining gravestones.
Over time, some resting places become abandoned, with crumbling headstones and overgrown inscriptions.
New burial spots are almost impossible to find in the historic graveyards, and the cemeteries within Paris’s city limits have been almost full since the beginning of the 20th century, according to the mayor’s office.
Paris authorities said inviting the public to clean up the tombstones was “a compromise” between respecting the dead and giving Parisians a chance to be buried in their city.
The lottery draw, which is so far limited to residents of the French capital, is scheduled to take place later in January.
It costs 125 euros (around $200 Cdn) to register, and winners will have to pay 4,000 euros (around $6,400 Cdn) to secure the gravesite they will be maintaining.
Those who are selected have six months to restore the allotted dilapidated tomb — working with approved stonemasons — after which they will be able to purchase a grave of their own.
Burial plots will cost around $28,000 for perpetual rights.
