The bell’s moniker is unknown it might be called for Sir Benjamin Hall, the man who oversaw its installation, or heavyweight boxing champion Benjamin Caunt. For 23 years, it was the biggest bell in the United Kingdom. On the 150th anniversary of the tower’s construction, celebrations were conducted on May 31, 2009.īig Ben is the tallest and heaviest of the five bells in the tower, weighing 13.5 tons (13.7 tonnes 15.1 short tons). The rose for England, thistle for Scotland, shamrock for Northern Ireland, and leek for Wales are all represented on the tower by shields with a rose for England, thistle for Scotland, shamrock for Northern Ireland, and leek for Wales. The clock’s dials are 22.5 feet (6.9 meters) in diameter. It has a square foundation that measures 40 feet (12 meters) on each side. The tower is 316 feet (96 meters) tall, with 334 steps from ground level to the belfry.

When it was finished in 1859, the clock was the world’s biggest and most accurate four-faced striking and chiming clock. The official name of the tower in which Big Ben is housed was originally Clock Tower, but in 2012, it was renamed Elizabeth Tower to commemorate Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee as Queen of the United Kingdom.Īugustus Pugin designed the tower in a neo– Gothic style. They started building the tower in 1843 and finished in 1859, making the tower more than 160 years old.Big Ben is a nickname for the Great Bell of the striking clock at the north end of the Palace of Westminster, however the term is also used to apply to the clock and the clock tower as well. The Palace of Westminster was destroyed in a catastrophic fire in 1834 and parliament decided that they would build a new clock tower as part of the restoration works. With four clockfaces on the tower, that’s a staggering 1,292 individual pieces of glass in total! #3 – Big Ben was built 164 years ago #2 – The clock face is made from hundreds of individual pieces of glassĮvery clock face is intricately made up of 324 pieces of pot opal glass, all held together with a cast iron frame. The tower itself was previously known as ‘The Clock Tower’, but in 2012 it was renamed Elizabeth Tower to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee. Although most people know this iconic landmark as Big Ben, this is actually the name of the bell in the tower – which weighs a whopping 13.7 tonnes! There are a lot of theories about where this name came from one of them being that the bell was named after Sir Benjamin Hall, the Chief Commissioner of Works, who was affectionately known as ‘Big Ben’.

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