GOOD NEWS! The great “Bourdon” bell of Notre-Dame in Paris speaks again!

Posted on 16 April 2020 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

In yesterday’s PASCHALCAzT 50, I used a bit of a recording of the huge “Bourdon” bell – named “Emmanuel” – of Notre-Dame in Paris. The sound is amazing. A “bourdon” is the bell with the lowest pitch in a carillon. It was not rung for a long time because of the force it put on the ancient tower. However, that tower was strengthened and the Bourdon rang out again. However, after the fire… not so much.

Now the mighty Emmanuel has rung again!

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3 Responses to GOOD NEWS! The great “Bourdon” bell of Notre-Dame in Paris speaks again!

  1. Mario Bird says:
    16 April 2020 at 3:24 PM

    Bourdon anticipation a la Andrei Rublev.

  2. Pingback: Morning Catholic must-reads: 17/04/2020 | Catholic Canada

  3. Semper Gumby says:
    17 April 2020 at 4:44 PM

    Mario Bird: Interesting, the director of “Andrei Rublev” could have been inspired by Notre Dame and its bells.

    The first attempt at that movie in Brezhnev-era Russia was banned, or maybe never went into production in the first place. In the late 1960s the director made revisions and had another go, thus “Andrei Rublev” was released in a censored version by Moscow in the 1970s.

    In the 2005 novel “Sophia House” Pawel Tarnowski, bookshop owner in 1942 Warsaw, writes a play titled “Andrei Rublev” which appears in full in the novel (O’Brien probably was influenced by that movie). Later in “Sophia House” a patron of Pawel’s bookshop, an official from the Reich Culture Office (a German literature professor, National Socialist Party member and Army major) remarks to Pawel that his play would be “improved” if it were “modernized” (i.e. sexualized) and a subversive element removed (the Tatar invaders in Tarnowski’s play could be construed as Teutonic invaders).

    Church bells date back to the early Middle Ages, maybe late Roman Empire, and were used to announce Mass, invasions, the Angelus and funerals. Monasteries in rural areas rang bells for lost travellers.

    If I recall, in 1940-41 Britain, with the threat of Nazi invasion which included paratroopers at night, Church bells were silenced and were to ring only in the event of invasion.

    John Donne’s For Whom the Bell Tolls:

    No man is an island,
    Entire of itself.
    Each is a piece of the continent,
    A part of the main.
    If a clod be washed away by the sea,
    Europe is the less.
    As well as if a promontory were.
    As well as if a manor of thine own
    Or of thine friend’s were.
    Each man’s death diminishes me,
    For I am involved in mankind.
    Therefore, send not to know
    For whom the bell tolls,
    It tolls for thee.

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