Thursday, May 31, 2018

Paris Day Five: Pantheon

The rain had pretty much stopped, so we walked all the way to the Latin Quarter to see the Pantheon.

There are always cool buildings to see while walking in Paris...

I don't know what this one is???


This is the Sainte-Genevieve Library across the street



And yet another gorgeous church behind:
Eglise Saint-Etienne-du-Mont de Paris. 
Wish we'd have had time to go in.

In 1744, Louis XV vowed that if he recovered from his serious illness he would rebuild the ruined Abbey of St Genevieve. He recovered and had this built. But it wasn't completed until 1790, the beginning of the French Revolution. It was then changed into a mausoleum to bury the honored dead of France.



"To Great Men, The Grateful Homeland"

And it is a worthy memorial for great men and women who contributed and gave so much to France and the world.













In 1851, Leon Foucault conducted his experiment to demonstrate the rotation of the Earth by constructing a 220-foot pendulum in the central dome. 



In the crypt are the tombs of so many famous people. I am once again embarrassed by how excited I was to see the burial places of people I have taught about for so many years. My favorites, I went there specifically to see them, were Pierre and Marie Curie, but I found so many others...









Then we walked back to Notre Dame to catch the bus back to the Arc de Triumphe for our last walk down the Champs Elysees to our hotel.



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