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Case file s1811 · Literature and art · 1778
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1778
Voltaire: French: Portrait de Voltaire (1694-1778) en 1718 Voltaire the age of twenty-four (?)title QS:P1476,fr:"Portrait de Volta
Voltaire. Nicolas de Largillière. CC0, Wikimedia Commons.
Died
30 May 1778
Place
Paris, France
Field
writer and philosopher · Literature and writing on the timeline
Legal tradition
French law (Ancien Régime) · Civil law
Historical event
The French Revolution; the Panthéon transfer of 11 July 1791
Religion
Voltaire: Atheist and agnostic (recorded as atheism on Wikidata)
Member of
Royal Society of London, Académie Française, Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences, Russian Academy of Sciences, Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, Freemasonry, Accademia della Crusca (Wikidata)
Literature and artSecret children and false heirsBodies, bones and burialsEmpires and conquestEuropeFrance

Voltaire was refused a Paris burial in 1778, buried in secret, moved to the Panthéon in 1791 with his heart kept apart, and a legend says his bones were thrown away in 1814

Voltaire returned to Paris in February 1778 for the opening of his tragedy Irène and died there aged 83. Because he had not retracted his criticism of the Church, he was denied a Christian burial in Paris. Friends and relatives buried his body in secret at the Abbey of Scellières in Champagne, where a relative of his niece was abbé. His heart and brain were embalmed separately. On 11 July 1791 the National Assembly moved his remains to the Panthéon; Wikipedia estimates a million people attended. The heart went to the national library, where it has been displayed since 1864 and is kept in the base of his statue. Legend holds that in 1814 ultra-royalist zealots stole his bones and threw them into a pit with lime. Historians call the story false, and one source says the coffin was opened in 1897 and the remains found inside†. The fate of the brain is unconfirmed†.

What the law took from it

When a person's burial is refused in life, the body becomes public property after death, and each regime can move it.

Sources
  1. jackboulware.substack.comPress
  2. paperspast.natlib.govt.nzPress
  3. solosophie.comPress
  4. Wikipedia (English)Encyclopedia

Cite as: celebrity.estate, “Voltaire was refused a Paris burial in 1778, buried in secret, moved to the Panthéon in 1791 with his heart kept apart, and a legend says his bones were thrown away in 1814,” story s1811, https://www.celebrity.estate/voltaire-1778, updated 30 October 2026.

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Where this case sits

Literature and artSecret children and false heirsBodies, bones and burialsEmpires and conquestEuropeCivil lawFrance