Bigben

Bigben is the nickname for the great bell of the clock at the north-eastern end of the Palace of Westminster in London.^[1] The nickname is often also used to refer to the clock and the clock tower.^[2][3][4] This is the world's largest, four-faced, chiming clock and the third largest, free-standing clock tower in the world.^[5] It celebrates its 150th birthday in 2009,^[6] during which celebratory events are planned.^[7]

The tower was raised as a part of Charles Barry's design for a new palace, after the old Palace of Westminster was destroyed by fire on the night of 22 October 1834.

The new Parliament was built in a Neo-gothic Italian style. Although Barry was the chief architect of the Palace, he turned to Augustus Pugin for the design of the clock tower, which resembles earlier Pugin designs, including one for Scarisbrick Hall. The design for the Clock Tower was Pugin's last design before his final descent into madness and death, and Pugin himself wrote, at the time of Barry's last visit to him to collect the drawings: "I never worked so hard in my life for Mr Barry for tomorrow I render all the designs for finishing his bell tower & it is beautiful."^[8] The tower is designed in Pugin's celebrated Gothic Revival style, and is 96.3 metres (315.9 ft) high.

The bottom 61 metres (200 ft) of the structure is the Clock Tower consists of brickwork with sand coloured Anston limestone cladding. The remainder of the tower's height is a framed spire of cast iron. The tower is founded on a 15-metre (49 ft) square raft, made of 3-metre (9.8 ft) thick concrete, at a depth of 4 metres (13 ft) below ground level. The four clock faces are 55 metres (180 ft) above ground. The interior volume of the tower is 4,650 cubic metres (164,200 cubic feet).

Because of changes in ground conditions since construction (notably tunnelling for the Jubilee Line extension), the tower leans slightly to the north-west, by roughly 220 millimetres (8.66 in) at the clock face, giving an inclination of approximately 1/250.^[9][10] Due to thermal effects it oscillates annually by a few millimetres east and west.

Clock

Faces

The clock faces are large enough to have once allowed the Clock Tower to be the largest four-faced clock in the world, but have since been outdone by the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. However, the builders of the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower did not add chimes to the clock, so the Great Clock of Westminster still holds the title of the "world's largest four-faced chiming clock".

The clock and dials were designed by Augustus Pugin. The clock faces are set in an iron frame 7 metres (23 ft) in diameter, supporting 312 pieces of opal glass, rather like a stained-glassgilded. At the base of each clock face in gilt letters is the Latin inscription DOMINE SALVAM FAC REGINAM NOSTRAM VICTORIAM PRIMAM, which means O Lord, keep safe our Queen Victoria the First. window. Some of the glass pieces may be removed for inspection of the hands. The surround of the dials is

Significance in popular culture

The clock has become a symbol of the United Kingdom and London, particularly in the visual media. When a television or film-maker wishes to quickly convey to a non-UK audience a generic location in Britain, a popular way to do so is to show an image of the Clock Tower, often with a Routemaster bus or Hackney carriage in the foreground.^[35] This gambit is less often used in the United Kingdom, as it would suggest to most British people a specific location in London, which may not be the intention. Big Ben is often polled as the Most Iconic London Film Location.^[36]