“Your name must be inscribed in the Pantheon.”
At the conclusion of his speech in tribute to Robert Badinter, during a national ceremony in his honor at Place Vendôme this Wednesday, Emmanuel Macron opened the way for the entry into the Pantheon of the former lawyer and father of the abolition of death penalty in France.
Who can enter this republican temple?
According to what criteria?
Who decides ?
Le Parisien takes stock of the modalities of pantheonization.
What is “pantheonization”?
It was during the French Revolution, in 1791, that the National Assembly decided to make the Pantheon, located in the 5th arrondissement of Paris and which until then had been a church, a temple to honor the memory of "the great men" who had marked the history of France by welcoming their ashes there.
The inscription “to the great men, the grateful homeland” is then inscribed on the pediment of this republican building.
A decree from 1885
will definitively establish the function of the Pantheon.
The first article specifies that “the remains of great men who have deserved national recognition will be deposited there”.
It is this entry that we call “pantheonization”.
This can be in the form of a simple plaque in the name of the deceased, a cenotaph (a funerary monument which does not contain a body) or a burial.
What are the entry criteria?
There is no text clearly defining the entry criteria, except that the Pantheon is reserved for “great men who have deserved national recognition”.
This implies that the personality embodied the values and ideals of the Republic during his lifetime.
French nationality is not necessary.
Also read “Pantheonization”: eleven short stories of “great men”
Of the 300 places available in the Pantheon crypt, only 81 are occupied to date, including six by women.
There we find revolutionaries, philosophers like Rousseau and Voltaire, soldiers and dignitaries of the Napoleonic empire, political figures such as Jean Jaurès or Léon Gambetta, writers like Victor Hugo or André Malraux, scientists including Pierre and Marie Curie , or even resistance fighters, like Jean Moulin and Germaine Tillon.
Who decides ?
Until the advent of the Fifth Republic, the deputies of the National Assembly decided who could enter the Pantheon, with the exception of the First Empire where Napoleon I assumed this prerogative.
But since 1958, it is the President of the Republic who is the sole decision-maker.
However, he can only propose the entry of a personality, the agreement of the family being necessary for the procedure to be launched.
A simple decree signed by the head of state is enough to confirm entry into the Pantheon.
Preparations can take several months, the date of the ceremony often being chosen symbolically in relation to the history of the pantheonized personality.
Macron’s pantheonized personalities
Under his presidency, Emmanuel Macron brought in three major figures: Simone Veil, Maurice Genevoix and Joséphine Baker.
The first, a figure in French and European politics at the origin of the law on abortion in France and a survivor of Auschwitz, was on July 1, 2018. Her family did not want her to be separated from her husband Antoine, the president, had agreed that the couple enter together.
The former poilu and writer Maurice Genevoix was pantheonized on November 11, 2020, 102 years to the day after the Armistice of November 11, 1918. By this pantheonization, Emmanuel Macron intended to honor “all those of 14”, these “ordinary heroes” .
Also read: Voltaire, Hugo, Simone Veil, the dome, the skylight... the heroes and jewels of the Pantheon
The last entry into the Pantheon is that of Joséphine Baker, on November 30, 2021, for her resistance activity during the Second World War and her incarnation of the combats of the 20th century.
The Franco-American music hall star and anti-racist activist became the first black personality and the first artist to join the Pantheon.
Who will enter next?
The resistance couple Missak and Mélinée Manouchian will enter the Pantheon during a ceremony scheduled for February 21, 80 years to the day after the execution by the Germans at Mont-Valérien of the Armenian poet and worker who immigrated to France.
Robert Badinter should therefore be next.
At the end of the national tribute ceremony, the entourage of the Head of State told AFP that his family had given their agreement on Wednesday morning, specifying that "the date and modalities are to be discussed with them ".