25 Notre-Dame Facts: Height, Dimensions, Bells and Surprising Stories

Notre-Dame dimensions

For comparison, the towers are as tall as a 20-story building, and the Statue of Liberty from base to torch (46 m without its pedestal) would fit under the top of the towers with room to spare.

Fun facts about Notre-Dame’s construction

1. It took nearly two centuries to complete. Work began in 1163 and ended around 1345. Read the full story in our history of Notre-Dame.
2. Nobody knows who the first architect was. The original master builder’s name was never recorded.
3. It is built from Paris itself. The stone is Lutetian limestone, quarried under what are now the Left Bank’s streets; the old quarries later became the Catacombs.
4. The roof frame was called « the Forest ». Its oak beams came from around 1,300 trees; more than 1,000 oaks from French forests were used to rebuild it after 2019.
5. It was one of the first buildings with flying buttresses on such a scale, added when the walls started to crack under the vault.
6. The spire is a 19th-century addition. The medieval one was removed in the 1780s; Viollet-le-Duc designed a new one in 1859, rebuilt identically in 2024.

Surprising stories

7. Point Zero of France is a bronze star on the square in front of the cathedral: all road distances from Paris are measured from it.
8. The 28 kings on the façade are not French kings. They represent the kings of Judah, ancestors of Christ, but revolutionaries beheaded them in 1793, believing they were French monarchs.
9. Their heads were found in 1977, buried in the courtyard of a Paris mansion, and are displayed at the Musée de Cluny.
10. Napoleon crowned himself here in 1804, taking the crown from the Pope’s hands.
11. Victor Hugo saved it. His 1831 novel turned public opinion and led to the great restoration of the 1840s–1860s.
12. The cathedral was nearly demolished in the early 19th century: it was in such a bad state that its destruction was discussed.
13. The rooster on the spire holds relics. The original rooster survived the 2019 fire, dented; the new one, designed as a « phoenix » rooster, contains relics and a document listing the names of the restoration workers.
14. The bees survived. Three beehives on the roof of the sacristy came through the 2019 fire intact.
15. The fire did not destroy the rose windows. The three great roses, including much 13th-century glass in the north rose, survived.

Bells, music and treasures

16. Emmanuel, the great bell of the south tower, was cast in 1686 and weighs about 13 tons. Only Emmanuel survived the melting of the bells during the Revolution.
17. There are 10 bells in the towers: eight in the north tower (recast in 2013) and two great bourdons in the south tower, Emmanuel and Marie.
18. The great organ has about 8,000 pipes and five keyboards. It was dismantled, cleaned pipe by pipe and reassembled after the fire. Free recitals are held on Sunday afternoons.
19. The Crown of Thorns, bought by King Saint Louis in 1239, is kept at Notre-Dame and presented to the faithful on certain Fridays.
20. The chimeras are younger than you think. The famous stone monsters on the gallery were added by Viollet-le-Duc in the 19th century. Learn the difference in our gargoyles and chimeras guide.

Notre-Dame in numbers today

21. About 11 million visitors in 2025, or 30,000 to 35,000 a day.
22. €846 million donated after the fire by some 340,000 donors from 150 countries.
23. Entry is free, as for all French cathedrals used for worship. See our reservations guide.
24. Disney’s « The Hunchback of Notre Dame » (1996) and the French musical « Notre-Dame de Paris » (1998) both come from Hugo’s novel.
25. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site as part of the « Paris, Banks of the Seine » listing (1991).