Notre Dame obtained three new bells as cathedral reopening nears : NPR
A bell, middle, that Olympic medalists rang on the Paris Video games, is seen earlier than being put in in Notre Dame Cathedral, forward of the monument’s grandiose reopening following an enormous fireplace and five-year reconstruction effort, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024 in Paris.
Christophe Ena/AP
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Christophe Ena/AP
PARIS — Paris’s Notre Dame cathedral, whose historic bells had been silenced following 2019’s devastating fireplace, will quickly echo once more with contemporary chimes.
On Thursday, the Gothic landmark took supply of three new bells, together with one which was used within the metropolis’s Stade de France stadium throughout this 12 months’s Paris Olympic Video games.
The Olympic bell, a present from the Paris 2024 organizing committee, might be put in alongside two smaller bells, named Chiara and Carlos, above the altar the place they are going to be rung throughout Mass, officers mentioned.
Their arrival forward of Notre Dame’s reopening on Dec. 8 marks a milestone within the painstaking restoration and modernization of the 861-year-old cathedral, made well-known all over the world by Victor Hugo’s “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”
Olivier Ribadeau Dumas, rector of Notre Dame, expressed gratitude for the bells’ arrival throughout a ceremony.
“What a pleasure it’s,” he mentioned. “At crucial second of the Mass these bells will ring, simply as they did when the victor of a contest might have a good time their victory.”
Throughout the Paris 2024 Video games, the long-lasting Olympic bell was rung by every monitor and area winner.
It bears the mark “Paris 2024,” whereas the 2 others are adorned with a spherical image combining the picture of Notre Dame’s iconic rosary window with a monstrance, a spiritual vessel central to the cathedral’s altar.
A bell is seen earlier than its set up in Notre-Dame cathedral, forward of the monument’s grandiose reopening following an enormous fireplace and five-year reconstruction effort, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024 in Paris. (AP Photograph/Christophe Ena)
Christophe Ena/AP
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Christophe Ena/AP
Crafted by the famend Cornille Havard foundry, in Villedieu-les-Poêles, Normandy, the bells embody France’s distinguished bell-making custom.
In a solemn second, Dumas consecrated the bells with holy water and a tree department.
Standing on the sq. outdoors the cathedral, he and Tony Estanguet, head of the Paris 2024 organizing committee, struck the bells with a picket mallet to mark the event.
“What a robust image it’s to see this second life given to the Paris 2024 bell, which introduced us so many feelings throughout these Video games,” Estanguet mentioned.
The bells change three that had been beforehand positioned close to Notre Dame’s Nineteenth-century spire, which dramatically collapsed throughout the fireplace which ripped via the cathedral’s rafters and roof.
The brand new bells might be positioned in a special location inside the cathedral, officers mentioned, the place their return will add to the soundscape of Notre Dame’s every day life.
They be part of the eight historic bells from the cathedral’s north tower that had been reinstalled in September after being cleaned and renovated.
These bells—Gabriel, Anne-Geneviève, Denis, Marcel, Étienne, Benoît-Joseph, Maurice, and Jean-Marie—had been initially solid in 2013 for Notre Dame’s 850th anniversary.
The cathedral’s two bigger bells stay intact on the south tower and had been unaffected by the blaze, officers added.
The reconstruction of Notre Dame has concerned greater than 250 firms and tons of of expert craftsmen.
The Olympic bell is not the one image of outdated assembly new in Notre-Dame’s evolving restoration.
Perched atop the newly designed spire, a golden rooster, reimagined by chief architect Philippe Villeneuve, marks a mix of the cathedral’s historical spirit with a contemporary contact.
The weathervane, which resembles a phoenix with flames licking its wings, is described as a testomony to hope and revival.
