The Sound of Notre Dame's Ancient Bell

While the Revolutionaries of 1791 smashed and melted down Marie, the great church bell of Notre Dame's north tower, the other bell in the south tower, Emmanuel, was spared, making it one of the largest and oldest bells of Europe.

Forged in 1685, it weighs 13 tons (the ringer alone weighs 500 kilos).  Normally you won't hear Emmanuel ring, since it's reserved for the Cathedral's special occasions like Christmas, Easter, and Ascension. It also rings for state funerals and calls the city's Catholics to prayer in times of great mourning, like the day after September 11.

Today I happened to be walking by as Emmanuel rang for Pentecost services. You can clearly hear its deep ringing (in F#) over the smaller bells:

Comments

[BrotherG]

Quelle grande façon d'accueillir la journée.

[Mike]

Seeing Emmanuel in the bellfry of Notre Dame is without question one of my personal highlights of Paris. How they built the cathedral to incorporate the bell into the tower simply astonishes me.

Now to engineer a return visit to hear it as well.

Thanks. H.

[Carmine]

Hi, thanks for sharing Emmanuel's voice, that I shared to our readers here

http://www.travelblog.it/post/10700/video-il-suono-di-emmanuel-notre-dame-de-paris