The tombstone of Fryderyk Chopin
"A Varsovian by birth, a Pole in his heart, and a citizen of the world by his talent [...]" is how Cyprian Kamil Norwid described Fryderyk Chopin. The most outstanding Polish composer spent almost half of his life in France. It was there that he developed his talent, composed most of his works, and gained fame and recognition. It was there that he died on 17 October 1849. Chopin's tomb is located in the Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris.

Fryderyk Chopin arrived in the French capital on 5 October 1831. He maintained contacts with the most outstanding representatives of the local artistic milieu, including the composers François Liszt and Hector Berlioz and the painter Eugène Delacroix. He took part in the life of the Polish émigré community, and was friends with Cyprian Kamil Norwid and Adam Mickiewicz. He absorbed the local atmosphere and culture, gave concerts, and was also active as a teacher, giving piano lessons. With time, due to his deteriorating health, his artistic activities gradually declined. Frédéric Chopin died on 17 October 1849. An examination of the composer's heart, carried out by a team of Polish scientists in 2014, identified the cause of death as pericarditis caused by tuberculosis.

Chopin 's funeral
Chopin's funeral took place on 30 October at St Magdalene's Church in Paris. The solemn funeral procession at the Père-Lachaise cemetery, led by Duke Adam Jerzy Czartoryski, was attended by a crowd of Chopin's friends and compatriots, as well as many eminent personalities from the French cultural world. The composer was, of course, bid farewell with music - during the funeral, excerpts from Mozart's Requiem were performed, which was one of Chopin's last wishes.

Fryderyk Chopin's grave at Père-Lachaise cemetery
. Chopin's burial place is decorated with a monument by the French painter and sculptor Jean-Baptiste Clésinger (known as Auguste). It was unveiled on 17 October 1850, the first anniversary of the composer's death. The tombstone consists of a simple plinth on which is placed a marble figure of the muse Euterpe leaning over a broken lyre. The front wall of the pedestal is decorated with a medallion with an image of Chopin depicted in profile to the left. Above it is the inscription: 'À FRÉD. CHOPIN / SES AMIS' (to Fryderyk Chopin / his friends). Further inscriptions, in French, appear on the sides of the pedestal and give information on Chopin's place of birth and his family background.

After many efforts on the Polish side, the tomb of Fryderyk Chopin - finally, in 2008, in accordance with an order of the Minister of Culture and Communication of the French Republic - was entered on the list of Historical Monuments. This act obliges the owner of the object to take all measures to ensure professional conservation care.

At the end of 2016, the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage decided to secure funds and endeavour to obtain conservation permits to carry out comprehensive work on Chopin's tomb. The Society for the Care of Polish Historical Monuments and Tombs in France applied for permission from the authorities of the Île de France department. The conservation work was carried out by Polish conservators in 2017-2018 thanks to funds from the Programme of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage obtained by the Foundation for the Protection of the Common Cultural Heritage Terpa.

The tombstone in the Père-Lachaise cemetery is not Clésinger's only work dedicated to Frederic Chopin. The sculptor, who was the husband of Solange Dupin, daughter of George Sand, with whom Chopin was associated, made some 17 works dedicated to the composer. On the day after his death, he removed two facial moulds in order to make post-mortem masks and made a cast of his left hand. The replicas of Chopin's death mask known to this day are a retouched image of the composer's face deformed by death.

Chopin's heart
In accordance with Chopin's last wish, his heart was brought to the country. This wish - apart from the desire to return, if only in this form, to his homeland - was dictated by the then common fear of apparent death and burial during his lifetime. The heart was secretly transported to Warsaw by Chopin's elder sister, Ludwika Jędrzejewicz, in January 1850. The jar in which the organ was placed was hidden under her clothes for fear of a search. Eventually, the heart was placed in the Church of the Holy Cross in Warsaw - the parish church of the artist's family. For many years it was not properly displayed - originally it was placed in the sacristy, then stored in the catacombs. It was not until 1880 that it was honoured and moved to the upper church, where an epitaph plaque dedicated to Fryderyk Chopin was unveiled. It features a highly eloquent quotation from the Gospel according to St Matthew: "Where your treasure is, there your heart is".