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Every fact

168 facts, every one sourced

Every fact on this site in one list, each linked to its source. Our build stores the source text and checks that the key words and figures in each fact really appear in it; see the sources page.

  1. 1 Big Ben is, strictly, the nickname of the Great Bell. The tower’s official name was simply the Clock Tower, but people all over the world call the whole thing Big Ben after the bell. UK Parliament
  2. 2 On 25 June 2012 the House of Commons Commission renamed the Clock Tower the Elizabeth Tower, for Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee, after a campaign backed by MPs across the House. UK Parliament
  3. 3 Queen Victoria had a similar honour: the big tower at the southern end of the Palace, the royal entrance, is the Victoria Tower. UK Parliament
  4. 4 The Elizabeth Tower is 96 metres tall, with 11 floors; Parliament compares it to 21 London buses stacked on top of each other. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  5. 5 It is 281 steps up to the clock faces and 334 to the belfry, where Big Ben hangs. Another 65 steps take you to the Ayrton Light. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  6. 6 The tower contains about 850 cubic metres of stone and 2,600 cubic metres of brick: Anston stone from Yorkshire, Clipsham stone from Rutland and Caen limestone from France. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  7. 7 For all its height, the tower stands on a footprint of only 12 metres square. UK Parliament
  8. 8 UNESCO’s description of the World Heritage Site says the Palace, the clock tower and the sound of Big Ben have become internationally recognised symbols of Britain and democracy. UNESCO
  9. 9 The Palace of Westminster, with Westminster Abbey and St Margaret’s Church, was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 1987. UNESCO
  10. 10 The Houses of Parliament, including the Elizabeth Tower, are a Grade I listed building, first listed on 5 February 1970 (list entry 1226284). Historic England
  11. 11 Historic England’s list entry describes the clock tower at the end of New Palace Yard as virtually free-standing. Historic England
  12. 12 A clock tower is said to have stood on the site in the 1290s, but there are no records of it. UK Parliament, key dates
  13. 13 In 1367 a new tower and clock were built; Parliament calls it the first public chiming clock in England. UK Parliament, key dates
  14. 14 In 1698 the medieval clock tower was pulled down and a sundial put up in its place. UK Parliament, key dates
  15. 15 Its old bell was sent to St Paul’s Cathedral in 1699 and broke on the way. UK Parliament, key dates
  16. 16 Recast in 1716, that bell later hung in the south-west tower of St Paul’s, and if Big Ben is ever unable to strike, the St Paul’s bell is heard instead. UK Parliament, key dates
  17. 17 The old Palace of Westminster was almost completely burned down in 1834. Only Westminster Hall, St Stephen’s Cloister and the Chapel of St Mary Undercroft survived much as they were. UK Parliament
  18. 18 In June 1835 a public competition was held to design a new palace in Gothic or Elizabethan style. There were 97 entries, and the Royal Commission chose entry number 64 unanimously. UK Parliament
  19. 19 Entry 64 was by the architect Charles Barry. It had two towers: a grand royal entrance to the south and a smaller clock tower to the north. UK Parliament
  20. 20 Barry may have been inspired by old engravings that showed a clock tower standing in New Palace Yard in medieval times. UK Parliament
  21. 21 The clock tower in Barry’s original proposal was not the 96-metre tower we know. UK Parliament
  22. 22 Barry took inspiration from a clock tower at Scarisbrick Hall in Lancashire, designed by Augustus Welby Pugin, a young Gothic Revival architect who became Barry’s collaborator on the decorative details. UK Parliament
  23. 23 Under Pugin’s influence the clock tower grew in size and importance, with large clock dials under a tall, two-stage spire. UK Parliament
  24. 24 Pugin added the symbols of the four parts of the United Kingdom, the leek, thistle, rose and shamrock, alongside the Tudor portcullis and fleur-de-lys. UK Parliament
  25. 25 The portcullis, used all over the new palace, became the emblem of both the House of Commons and the House of Lords. UK Parliament
  26. 26 The tower designs were Pugin’s last important set of drawings. He died in 1852, aged only 40, and never saw the finished tower. UK Parliament
  27. 27 As he worked, Pugin wrote: “I never worked so hard in my life for Mr Barry for tomorrow I render all the designs for finishing his bell tower and it is beautiful.” UK Parliament
  28. 28 Building the new palace began in 1840, and Barry brought in Pugin to help with its Gothic Revival style. UK Parliament, key dates
  29. 29 Historic England dates the new palace to 1835–60, by Sir Charles Barry, with detailing, interiors and furnishings by A. W. N. Pugin. Historic England
  30. 30 UNESCO notes that Westminster Abbey inspired Barry’s and Pugin’s Gothic Revival work on the palace. UNESCO
  31. 31 The foundation stone of the clock tower was laid on 28 September 1843. UK Parliament
  32. 32 Materials came from all over: bricks from Hendon in Middlesex, stone from Anston near Sheffield, paving from Hopton Wood in Derbyshire, slate from the Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire, and stone for the interior from Caen in Normandy. UK Parliament
  33. 33 Anston stone was chosen because it was cheaper, could be carved more elaborately, and was close to the Chesterfield Canal for transport to London. UK Parliament, 2021
  34. 34 The tower was built from the inside out: Londoners watched it rise with no workmen or materials in sight. UK Parliament
  35. 35 Steam-powered winches lifted materials up a shaft inside the tower, so no scaffolding was needed; a gantry on top was jacked up as the tower grew. UK Parliament
  36. 36 Sixty-one metres of brickwork faced with sand-coloured Anston stone went up before the two-tier iron spire was added. UK Parliament
  37. 37 Inside there was a stone spiral staircase in one corner, an air shaft to bring fresh air to the palace, and a weight shaft for the clock in the centre. UK Parliament
  38. 38 Low down there were rooms for prisoners, meaning MPs who broke the rules of the House of Commons, with document stores above. UK Parliament
  39. 39 Grissell and Peto built the tower up to the level of the clock dials; John Jay of London built the dials and roof section. UK Parliament
  40. 40 Jabez James of Lambeth made the roof ironwork, the great frame for the five bells and the four cast-iron dials. John Hardman of Birmingham did cast-iron details on the roof, and F. Crace & Son painted and gilded. UK Parliament
  41. 41 Building fell five years behind schedule, and Parliament moved into its new home before the tower was finished. From foundation stone to the first bells took sixteen years. UK Parliament
  42. 42 Barry was no clock specialist. He first asked Benjamin Lewis Vulliamy, the Queen’s Clockmaker, but other clockmakers such as Edward John Dent wanted the job, and disputes broke out. UK Parliament
  43. 43 In 1846 a competition was held to decide who would build the clock, refereed by the Astronomer Royal, Sir George Airy. UK Parliament
  44. 44 Airy wanted the most accurate turret clock in the world: the first stroke of each hour had to be right to within one second. UK Parliament
  45. 45 Until then, time had largely gone by the sun, so it varied by about 15 minutes across Britain. UK Parliament
  46. 46 The accuracy rules meant it took seven years before the designs were finalised. UK Parliament, key dates
  47. 47 The winning designs, in February 1852, were by Edmund Beckett Denison, a lawyer and amateur clock expert, so the chronometer maker Edward John Dent was appointed to build the clock. UK Parliament
  48. 48 The mechanism took two years to make and cost £2,500, which Parliament puts at about £285,000 today. UK Parliament
  49. 49 The clock mechanism was completed in 1854, years before the tower was ready for it. UK Parliament, key dates
  50. 50 The clock was installed in April 1859, once the building work was complete, and began keeping time on 31 May 1859. UK Parliament
  51. 51 To check it, the time from the Royal Observatory at Greenwich was sent to Westminster by telegraph wire. The clock passed. UK Parliament
  52. 52 There are four clock dials, each made of 324 pieces of pot opal glass in a cast-iron frame. Parliament’s facts page gives the dials as 7 metres across, with hour figures 60 centimetres long. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  53. 53 Parliament’s tour page says each dial spans 6.9 metres in diameter. UK Parliament tours
  54. 54 The minute hands are copper sheet, 4.2 metres long and 100 kilograms each. They travel about 190 kilometres a year, roughly London to Weymouth. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  55. 55 The hour hands are gunmetal, 2.7 metres long and three times heavier, at 300 kilograms. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  56. 56 Four o’clock is shown as IV, not the IIII found on many clocks. UK Parliament, 2021
  57. 57 Each beat of the pendulum lasts two seconds. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  58. 58 The clock is fine-tuned with pre-decimal pennies: adding one makes the clock gain two-fifths of a second in 24 hours. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  59. 59 Wind on the huge hands could upset the timekeeping, so Denison designed the ‘Double Three-legged Gravity Escapement’, which compensates for outside forces on the mechanism. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  60. 60 Parliament’s facts page says the mechanism weighs 5 tonnes, is made of cast iron, and is 4.7 metres long and 1.4 metres wide. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  61. 61 The same page gives the pendulum as 4.4 metres long and 310 kilograms, with a 203-kilogram bob made of concentric steel and zinc tubes. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  62. 62 In 1930 an MP complained that Big Ben was three minutes slow compared with every other clock. The minister replied that in 290 days the error had passed one second on only eight, and that “all the others are wrong and that Big Ben is right”. UK Parliament
  63. 63 The Great Clock was the largest and most accurate clock in the world when it was built, and it is still the biggest striking and chiming turret clock in the UK. UK Parliament
  64. 64 Parliament lists some long Great Clock stoppages: two months in 1934, six months in 1956, and six weeks in 2007, the longest since 1990. In 2005 it stopped for two days so the brake shaft could be inspected. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  65. 65 On 5 August 1976 a mechanical failure badly damaged the clock: the weights spiralled out of control down the weight shaft and the mechanism blew apart. Big Ben was silent for nearly nine months, back in time for the Queen’s Silver Jubilee visit to Westminster Hall in May 1977. UK Parliament, key dates
  66. 66 In 2007 Big Ben and the quarter bells were silenced from 11 August to 1 October for maintenance on the clock. UK Parliament, key dates
  67. 67 There are more than 2,000 clocks on the Parliamentary Estate, and Parliament’s clock mechanics change them all, the Great Clock included, when the clocks go forward and back. UK Parliament, 2021
  68. 68 Barry’s plan needed bells: a Great Bell to strike the hours and four smaller quarter bells to chime every fifteen minutes. UK Parliament
  69. 69 John Warner’s foundry near Stockton-on-Tees cast the first Great Bell in August 1856, and his firm cast the four quarter bells at Cripplegate in London later that year. UK Parliament
  70. 70 The bell was originally to be called ‘Royal Victoria’. UK Parliament, key dates
  71. 71 The new bell came by rail and sea and was pulled across Westminster Bridge by 16 white horses. UK Parliament
  72. 72 On 22 October 1856 The Times reported that the bell had arrived and that it was proposed to call it “Big Ben” in honour of Sir Benjamin Hall, then in charge of public works. Word Histories
  73. 73 Benjamin Hall (1802–67) was a Welsh politician and civil engineer, First Commissioner of Works from 1855 to 1858. Word Histories
  74. 74 Parliament says the bell was probably named after Sir Benjamin Hall in fun, because he was a tall man. UK Parliament
  75. 75 Another theory links the name to the bare-knuckle boxing champion Ben Caunt, also known as ‘Big Ben’; HISTORY calls Hall the most likely source. HISTORY
  76. 76 Hall’s name is inscribed on the bell. HISTORY
  77. 77 In December 1856 the first test hammer, tried in New Palace Yard, was described as weighing “nearly, or quite, a half ton”. Word Histories
  78. 78 Denison wanted the loudest sound possible and used a huge hammer. The bell was tested daily until 17 October 1857, when a crack 1.2 metres long appeared. The hammer was too heavy. UK Parliament
  79. 79 Warners, who made the bell, and Denison, who designed the clock, argued over who was to blame. UK Parliament, key dates
  80. 80 The cracked bell was melted down and recast by George Mears at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry on 10 April 1858. That second bell is the one in the tower today. UK Parliament
  81. 81 Parliament’s clock-history page says the new bell weighed 13.5 tonnes, 2.5 tonnes lighter than the first. UK Parliament
  82. 82 To get it into the belfry, the bell was turned on its side and winched up the ventilation shaft. It took 30 hours. UK Parliament
  83. 83 Big Ben rang out for the first time on 11 July 1859. In September it cracked too, and for four years the largest quarter bell struck the hours instead. UK Parliament
  84. 84 Airy’s fix: turn the bell 90 degrees so the hammer hits a different spot, and fit a lighter hammer. A small square was cut out to stop the crack spreading. The crack and the hole are still visible. UK Parliament
  85. 85 The fix was made in 1863, and Big Ben struck the hours again. UK Parliament, key dates
  86. 86 Parliament’s facts page gives Big Ben’s weight as 13.7 tonnes, with a 200-kilogram hammer. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  87. 87 Parliament’s 2017 announcement also gives 13.7 tonnes, and says the bell strikes the hour on the note E. UK Parliament, 2017
  88. 88 None of the bells swings. They hang fixed and are struck from outside by hammers, not by clappers inside. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  89. 89 The quarter bells weigh 1.1, 1.3, 1.7 and 4 tonnes. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  90. 90 The notes: Big Ben is E; the quarter bells are G, F sharp, E and B. UK Parliament, facts and figures
  91. 91 Denison chose the tune for the quarter bells: the ‘Cambridge Quarters’, from the church of Great St Mary’s in Cambridge. UK Parliament
  92. 92 Struck by the lighter hammer, the Great Bell gives what Parliament calls a soulful E. UK Parliament
  93. 93 BBC Radio first broadcast the chimes across the UK on New Year’s Eve 1923, and in 1932 the Empire Service carried them abroad for the first time, in King George V’s Christmas broadcast. UK Parliament, key dates
  94. 94 The hour bell has been tolled slowly to mark the deaths of four sovereigns: Edward VII, George V, George VI and Elizabeth II. For Sir Winston Churchill’s funeral, the bells were silent as a mark of respect. UK Parliament
  95. 95 Acton Smee Ayrton, First Commissioner of Works from 1869 to 1873, had the idea of a light near the top of the tower to show when the House was sitting. UK Parliament
  96. 96 Parliament’s history page says the permanent Ayrton Light was installed in 1892 by J. Edmundson & Co., using a Wigham lighthouse lamp, and was first lit by gas. UK Parliament
  97. 97 A 2021 Parliament news story describes the Ayrton Light as a lantern-like structure installed in 1885, which shines whenever either House sits after dark. UK Parliament, 2021
  98. 98 The light is said to have been put there at Queen Victoria’s request, so she could see from Buckingham Palace when Parliament was sitting after dark. UK Parliament, 2021
  99. 99 The Ayrton Light went electric in 1903, and the dial lighting changed from gas to electricity in 1906. UK Parliament
  100. 100 From 1939 to 1945 the dial lights and the Ayrton Light were switched off, so the tower could not help German bombers find their way. UK Parliament
  101. 101 The Palace was hit by bombs 14 times. On 10–11 May 1941 a small bomb hit the clock tower and broke all the glass in the south dial, but the clock and bells were undamaged and the chimes were broadcast as usual. UK Parliament
  102. 102 Broadcast on the radio, the bells became a symbol of freedom during the Second World War. UK Parliament
  103. 103 Decades later, modern surveys found fractures and structural damage that could not be detected with the methods of the 1940s and 1950s. UK Parliament
  104. 104 Before 2017 the tower had been wrapped in scaffolding for repairs three times: in the 1930s, 1950s and 1980s. UK Parliament
  105. 105 By the 2010s the tower had the problems of any building its age: crumbling stone, rusty ironwork, leaking roofs and an ageing clock. UK Parliament
  106. 106 The last big repairs had been in 1983–85. UK Parliament
  107. 107 Pollution had badly damaged the stone, and the black paint around the dials had stopped the stonework from breathing. UK Parliament
  108. 108 Wrapped in scaffolding from 2017 to 2022, the tower was repaired from the gilt cross and orb at the top to the foot of its 334-step staircase. UK Parliament
  109. 109 The project was separate from the wider Restoration and Renewal programme for the Palace, because a feasibility study showed the tower could not wait. UK Parliament
  110. 110 Parliament announced that the bongs would sound for the last time before the works at noon on Monday 21 August 2017. UK Parliament, 2017
  111. 111 Parliament said Big Ben had marked the hour with almost unbroken service for 157 years. UK Parliament, 2017
  112. 112 After concerns from a number of MPs, the House of Commons Commission said it would consider how long the bells would be silent. UK Parliament, 2017
  113. 113 The bongs stopped after the 12 noon chimes on 21 August 2017; the striking was paused to protect the people working in the tower. UK Parliament
  114. 114 Parliament’s clock mechanics still made sure Big Ben could strike for New Year’s Eve and Remembrance Sunday. UK Parliament
  115. 115 One clock face was kept visible at all times so people could still set their watches by it. UK Parliament, 2017
  116. 116 From 2017 an electric motor drove the hands on the visible dial while the real mechanism was away. UK Parliament, 2021
  117. 117 The contract went to Sir Robert McAlpine Ltd in September 2017. UK Parliament, 2017
  118. 118 It took six months to put up one of the most complex scaffolds in British history. It was free-standing, built around the tower without touching the stonework. UK Parliament
  119. 119 A note to the Commons Finance Committee calls it the largest free-standing scaffold in Europe. Finance Committee note
  120. 120 Once the scaffolding was up, it soon became clear that the damage was much worse than expected. UK Parliament
  121. 121 The survey found decayed carvings, asbestos in the belfry, extensive toxic lead paint and broken glass in the dials. BBC News, 2020
  122. 122 Replacement stone came from a quarry near Doncaster, and each new piece took a stonemason at least two weeks to carve by hand with traditional tools. UK Parliament
  123. 123 By early 2020, 700 stone repairs had been needed, 300 more than first estimated. BBC News, 2020
  124. 124 The Finance Committee note says the stonework turned out to be more than four times what had been allowed for. Finance Committee note
  125. 125 Wartime bomb damage had hurt the roof’s cast-iron frame. All 3,343 pieces of the roof were taken off to a workshop, and new pieces were cast by hand at a foundry in Halifax. UK Parliament
  126. 126 That foundry was Hargreaves Foundry, and its ‘HF’ stamp can be seen on metalwork across the tower. UK Parliament, 2021
  127. 127 All 1,296 pieces of glass in the four dials were replaced with mouth-blown pot opal glass, cut and fitted by hand by stained-glass specialists from South London. UK Parliament
  128. 128 For the first time in its history the clock was dismantled, winched 53 metres down and taken away for a complete overhaul. Parliament’s conservation page calls it the 12-tonne clock. UK Parliament
  129. 129 The automatic winding mechanism fitted in 1912, parts of which were thought lost, was rebuilt. UK Parliament
  130. 130 In 2019 Parliament described the clock mechanism being taken apart as the 11-tonne mechanism. UK Parliament, 2019
  131. 131 The bell itself stayed where it was: Big Ben remained in the tower throughout the works. UK Parliament, 2019
  132. 132 The Cumbria Clock Company restored more than 1,000 clock parts at its workshop in Dacre, near Penrith. It was the first time the whole mechanism had left the tower. UK Parliament, 2021
  133. 133 The company said the parts together weigh eleven and a half tonnes, and gave the pendulum as 170 kilograms. UK Parliament, 2021
  134. 134 Neither Denison nor Dent kept detailed records of how the clock was built, so the company produced the first user manual and engineering drawings of the mechanism. UK Parliament, 2021
  135. 135 For two years the clock’s ‘heartbeat’, its timekeeping side, ticked away on test in the company’s workshop. UK Parliament, 2021
  136. 136 The Finance Committee note says it had been assumed Parliament’s own clock mechanics would do the clock work, but they did not have the capacity; the change cost about £2 million. Finance Committee note
  137. 137 Every piece of the Ayrton Light was taken down and restored by Shepley Engineers in Sheffield. UK Parliament, 2021
  138. 138 Paint experts from the University of Lincoln analysed more than 160 years of paint on the tower and found six different colour schemes. UK Parliament
  139. 139 The familiar black around the dials was probably chosen in the 1930s to hide the effects of pollution. UK Parliament
  140. 140 The restored dials and hands are Prussian blue and gold, as in Barry’s design, with the red, white and blue of the Union flag around them. UK Parliament
  141. 141 Above each dial a row of six shields shows St George’s red cross on white again. UK Parliament
  142. 142 On the roof, the shamrock and leek are green again, the thistle green with a purple head, and the rose red and white. UK Parliament
  143. 143 The regilded areas closely match those first gilded in 1859. UK Parliament
  144. 144 The North Dial was the first finished, in 2019, in the original Prussian blue and gilt. UK Parliament, 2019
  145. 145 The original hands came back in 2021, three years after they were taken down for conservation. UK Parliament, 2021
  146. 146 New work included a lift for maintenance and emergency access, and LED lighting, including in the Ayrton Light. UK Parliament
  147. 147 A glass box at the top of the stairs now gives visitors a much better view of Big Ben and the quarter bells. UK Parliament
  148. 148 More than 500 people from across the UK worked on the project, in trades from stone masonry and glass blowing to gilding, plastering, cast iron and clock mechanics. UK Parliament tours
  149. 149 Big Ben’s official return came at 11 am on Remembrance Sunday, 13 November 2022, striking eleven times for the Two Minutes’ Silence. UK Parliament, 2022
  150. 150 After five years, the bells returned to regular service in November 2022, following four days of tests. UK Parliament, 2022
  151. 151 At that point the outside was finished, and the main contractor was to stay on site until December 2022, with visitors expected back inside in 2023. UK Parliament, 2022
  152. 152 Parliament’s key-dates page says the conservation was completed in 2022. UK Parliament, key dates
  153. 153 The Finance Committee note gives the actual project completion as October 2023, including nine months of Covid impact. Finance Committee note
  154. 154 In 2019 the project was due to finish in 2021. UK Parliament, 2019
  155. 155 In spring 2016 the feasibility study estimated £29 million. By September 2017 the estimate was £61 million, including VAT, risk allowances and £4.5 million of fire-protection work moved in from another project. UK Parliament, 2017
  156. 156 In February 2020 the budget rose by £18.6 million to £79.7 million, after the discovery of bomb damage and asbestos. BBC News, 2020
  157. 157 A further £9 million was set aside for the effects of Covid-19, including a four-month site closure in 2020. Written answer, 2022
  158. 158 The Finance Committee note gives a total approved budget of £89 million and a final outturn cost, including Covid, of £85.5 million. Finance Committee note
  159. 159 The design consultant was Purcell Architecture and the main contractor Sir Robert McAlpine. Finance Committee note
  160. 160 Ian Westworth, one of Parliament’s clock mechanics: “This was the first time the Great Clock has been taken apart fully so we can assess and repair every wheel and pinion.” UK Parliament
  161. 161 The official tour climbs the 334-step spiral stair to the belfry. You see the clock mechanism, stand beside Big Ben as it strikes the hour, and step behind a dial. UK Parliament tours
  162. 162 Tickets are released three months ahead, on the second Wednesday of each month at 10 am. UK Parliament tours
  163. 163 For tours from 1 August 2026, tickets are £55 for adults and £35 for children aged 11 to 17, with up to eight tickets per booking. UK Parliament tours
  164. 164 Visitors must be 11 or over and comfortable climbing 334 steps with loud bells and machinery; ear defenders are provided. UK Parliament tours
  165. 165 The tour lasts up to 90 minutes, with planned pauses on the way up. UK Parliament tours
  166. 166 Accessible tours are available for visitors who would find parts of the standard tour difficult. UK Parliament tours
  167. 167 After the tour, visitors can explore medieval Westminster Hall. UK Parliament tours
  168. 168 From outside, look up: the Ayrton Light shines whenever either House is sitting. UK Parliament, 2022