Nineteenth-century French communal cemeteries, many of which are still in use today, are well known to historians, art historians, sociologists, urban planners and tourists. The spread of perpetual concessions during the 19th century, as materialized by monumental tombs, crystallized memories, but only those of the elites who could afford to acquire such sepulchres. Many cemeteries, more modest or located in the heart of the city due to urban growth, have closed down, offering the possibility of archaeological investigation. This “recent archaeology” is still marginal in France, however, and raises questions of legitimacy, ethics and memory for funeral sites. The old cemetery of Les Crottes (1784-1905), located in the northern districts of Marseille, benefited from a major preventive excavation operation between 2013 and 2014. It has produced the largest corpus of 19th century funerary structures ever found in France. The study of the site, combining archaeology, history and biological anthropology, allows us to follow the evolution of funeral practices and study a population of modest origin in the long 19th century.