The mere size of the place is the first thing you notice. It is 466 feet tall; it's almost preposterous to try to take it all in from an adjoining square. Why did something think it was necessary to go so high? We'll leave that for the scholars. It checks in at 477 feet, which made it the world's tallest building from 1647 to 1874. It's the tallest building still standing that was built entirely during the Middle Ages.
They started work on this in 1015, and they started to add to it in 1190. It was pronounced finished in 1439 - more than 50 years before Columbus got in a boat to search for the New World. As you'd expect, there were delays along the way, and the occasional fire broke out that caused a pause for repairs. Believe it or not, there were plans to build another tower at the other end of the building, but that never got done.
Speaking of repairs, an architect noticed in 1903 that cracks were started to show up. A full-scale replacement of the foundation using concrete was started in 1915 and finished in 1926. In other words, repairs started in Germany and finished in France.
Adolf Hitler paid a visit here in 1940. Bombings in World War II damaged the place, to the point where repairs weren't done until the 1990s. In the meantime, Pope John Paul II visited in 1988, the 2,000th anniversary of the city.
The inside of the place is as spectacular as you'd think, featuring an astronomical clock. The tourists show up in droves to see the place, inside and out, and it's easy to see why.
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