The Cedar of Pere Lachaise

The cedar on the axis of Pere Lachaise's main gate was there before the monument it frames. It was planted in 1870. Albert Bartholome's Monument aux Morts went up in 1899, and the cedar's long horizontal branches, held out like the arms of a candelabra, have framed it ever since. The tree has stood at the entrance of Pere Lachaise for over 150 years. It was barely a year in the ground in May 1871, when the last fighters of the Commune were shot against a wall at the other end of these same grounds. Since then it has watched more than a century of funerals and pilgrims come up the main avenue from the boulevard de Menilmontant. The city's page on the cemetery's wildlife and plants names it as one of nine remarkable trees here and calls it a cedar of Lebanon, 25 metres tall and 3.72 metres round. The register of remarkable trees gives it 407 centimetres, which may simply be a later measurement, and its scientific field reads Cedrus atlantica, the Atlas cedar, even though the same entry's French name says cedar of Lebanon. We follow the city page. The two species are close cousins and are often confused, so if you can tell them apart by the cones and needles, have a look and tell us.