Bell Towers
Bells are also associated with clocks, indicating the hour by ringing. Indeed, the word clock comes from the Latin word cloca, meaning bell. Clock towers or bell towers can be heard over long distances which was especially important in the time when clocks were too expensive for widespread use. In many languages the same word can mean both "clock" and "bell".
In the case of clock towers and grandfather clocks, a particular sequence of tones may be played to represent the hour. One common pattern is called the "Westminster Quarters," a sixteen-note pattern named after the Palace of Westminster which popularized it as the measure used by Big Ben.
Read more about this topic: Bell (instrument)
Famous quotes containing the words bell and/or towers:
“Those feelings of envy are familiar to many of us. We see our children accomplishing things that we’ve always been afraid to try, or we give them opportunities that we never had, and we find ourselves feeling jealousy mixed with our pride, or we feel resentful when they take it all for granted.”
—Ruth Davidson Bell (20th century)
“Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep;
Her march is o’er the mountain-waves,
Her home is on the deep.”
—Thomas Campbell (1774–1844)