Notre Dame de Paris

This is the Notre Dame de Paris cathedral, France. More commonly known simply as “Notre Dame” (Wikipedia page), it’s a gothic cathedral on the Île de la Cité, surrounded by the river Seine. Construction began in 1163, but wasn’t finished until 1345!

Notre Dame is probably most famous as the location of Victor Hugo’s novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame, which raised awareness of the cathedral enough to help save it from being demolished in the early 19th Century. In our thumbnail you can clearly see the south tower which houses the cathedral’s famous bell, “Emmanuel”, which weighs 13 metric tons!

Arrggh, the bells, the bells!

Thanks: Salinga, Baudouin Raoult, John Riggs, George Armhold, Bennet Langlotz, Paul C., Thom van Vreeswijk, UnjourenOz and Carl-Uno Ohlsson.