The Municipal Ossuary known as the Paris catacombs was first used in 1785 when the Council of State decided to prohibit the use of The Cemetery of the Innocents. This cemetery had been in use for at least ten centuries before this decision, but became a source of infection and disease (1). The dead were effectively banished from the center of the city and new solutions had to be found (2). It was decided that bones would be transferred out of this cemetery and into the underground section of the city. This process took a very long time, over two years, as piles of bones had to be carted from cemetery to the quarries. The transfers occured at night; horsedrawn carriages cloaked in black veils and lit by torchlight crossed the streets of Paris (3).

The resulting catacombs are located in the 14th district of Paris, and were originally excavated as stone quarries. This limestone resource proved to be important for many developers, going as far back as the first century AD when Gallo-Romans used the limestone to build Lutetia, a pre-Roman city. The resource was also used to build the Notre-Dame Cathedral (thirteenth century) and the Louvre. This excavation left underground caverns beneath the city, perfect for future projects.

An estimated six million bodies are located in the 20 metre deep cavern. Bones have been collected from various cemeteries and churches around