Pantheon
Commissioned by King Louis XV as a church dedicated to Sainte-Genevieve, the patron saint of Paris, and completed in the years just before the Revolution, the Pantheon was converted almost immediately into a secular mausoleum for France's great citizens, a purpose it has served, with a few political reversals back to a church and forward again, ever since. Its vast neoclassical dome and columned portico, modeled on Rome's own Pantheon and St. Paul's Cathedral in London, shelter a crypt holding the remains of Voltaire, Rousseau, Victor Hugo, Emile Zola, Marie Curie (the first woman interred there on her own merit), and resistance figures Jean Moulin and, more recently, Josephine Baker. Inside, a working reproduction of Leon Foucault's original 1851 pendulum still swings from the dome, the experiment that first offered visual proof of the Earth's rotation to a watching public. The building's motto carved above the entrance, 'Aux grands hommes, la patrie reconnaissante' (To great men, a grateful homeland), sums up its enduring role as France's secular hall of national memory.
Visitor Information & Practical Details
- Place NamePantheon
- AddressPlace du Pantheon, 75005 Paris, France
- Opening HoursOpen daily (check locally)
- Admission / PriceEUR 16 (~$17 USD)
- PhoneNot listed
- Official Websitehttps://www.paris-pantheon.fr/en
- GPS Coordinates48.84622, 2.34641
Best Itinerary Visiting Pantheon
Combine Pantheon with nearby landmarks using our step-by-step walking and transit route.
Places Near Pantheon
Build your own custom walking route in the MyGuide app by combining these nearby stops.
Panthรฉon
The Panthรฉon is a grand neoclassical monument in Paris originally built as a church and later transformed into a mausoleum honoring some of Franceโs most distinguished figures, featuring a massive dome, impressive frescoes, and the famous Foucault pendulum that demonstrates the rotation of the Earth.
Luxembourg Gardens
Luxembourg Gardens is one of the most beloved parks in Paris, known for its beautifully maintained lawns, fountains, statues, and the Luxembourg Palace, offering a relaxing environment where visitors can stroll, sit by the pond, and experience everyday Parisian life in a scenic setting.
NotreDameCathedral
Notre-Dame Cathedral is one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture, famous for its twin towers, intricate sculptures, and stunning stained glass windows, and it remains a symbol of Parisโs history, resilience, and cultural heritage despite the devastating fire in 2019.
Sainte-Chapelle
Sainte-Chapelle is a stunning Gothic chapel famous for its towering stained glass windows that fill the interior with vibrant colors and light, originally built to house religious relics, and it offers one of the most visually striking and intimate architectural experiences in Paris.
Saint-Germain-des-Pres
Saint-Germain-des-Pres is the legendary intellectual and artistic heart of Paris โ a neighborhood on the Left Bank whose cafes, bookshops, art galleries, and ancient abbey have made it one of the most celebrated addresses in the history of Western culture, synonymous with the existentialist philosophy that Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir developed at corner tables in the Cafe de Flore and Les Deux Magots in the years after World War II. The neighborhood's intellectual tradition stretches back centuries โ Voltaire, Rousseau, and other Enlightenment philosophers gathered in the cafes of Saint-Germain, and in the early 20th century the neighborhood became the center of the Paris art world when Picasso, Matisse, and other modernist artists settled in its studios. The jazz clubs of Saint-Germain became legendary in the 1950s and 1960s, when American musicians including Miles Davis, Chet Baker, and Sidney Bechet found appreciative audiences in the neighborhood's smoky basement clubs, creating a Franco-American jazz culture that was central to the postwar cultural renaissance of Paris. Today Saint-Germain-des-Pres has become one of the most fashionable and expensive neighborhoods in Paris โ its historic cafes now serve tourists and well-heeled locals, its bookshops compete with luxury fashion boutiques, and its galleries show works priced for collectors rather than starving artists โ but the neighborhood retains a distinct intellectual atmosphere and its ancient Romanesque abbey church, one of the oldest in Paris, remains a serene oasis in the midst of the busy streets.
Centre Pompidou
Opened in 1977 and named for President Georges Pompidou, who championed the project, the Centre Pompidou startled Paris on arrival with its inside-out architecture: structural beams, escalators, and color-coded service pipes (blue for air, green for water, yellow for electricity, red for movement) run along the exterior rather than being hidden inside, a radical design by architects Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers that freed the interior into vast, column-free, endlessly reconfigurable exhibition floors. That interior houses the Musee National d'Art Moderne, one of the largest collections of 20th and 21st century art in the world, spanning Matisse, Picasso, Kandinsky, and generations of contemporary practice, alongside a major public library and a lively plaza out front that has long attracted street performers and skateboarders. The building's exposed escalator tube, climbing diagonally up the facade in a transparent glass caterpillar, doubles as an informal observation deck, offering one of the more surprising rooftop panoramas over the Right Bank rooftops toward Sacre-Coeur.
