Church bells ring at 7am to tell the Swiss to stop for lunch...

Lol!! Yep I think you might be right on that one.

Amazing that there is a blog for church bell noise in Switzerland. It mentions the EF specifically:

Expatriates hate the constant noise of cowbells and churchbells in Switzerland
A forum for English speaking people living in Switzerland currently runs a few discussions about church bell- and cowbell noise.

http://www.kirchenglocken.ch/church-...e-switzerland/


Oh shoot... you mean to say people actually read these threads? Damn. I better start watching what I spew.

Nope, there's a large Jewish community in Basel, with a lovely temple



But fortunately for all bell-ringing-haters, they don't ring bells

Walking home tonight in Zurich at 3 o'clock I remembered this post and noticed it was not the Catholic church's bell that rang in the hour (and quarter hours thereafter) but the/a Protestant one.

Maybe the Catholic ones remind Catholics of church services to attend whereas the Protestant ones just remind others of the relentless march of time (and that attendance is in accordance to demeanour).
The daily extended (but probably automated) ringing of bells seems to be at 11am and 7pm daily at my place (not sure which church). I haven't heard 10pm ones here.

Here in Adlsiwil there are two sets of bells designed to annoy you, there's a battle going on between the Catholics on one side of the valley and the Protestants on the other. Both churches have bells that ring at all times, one of them through the night too.

Strange isn't it, the Swiss get very upset about Muezzin's wailing from towers but have no problem with idiotic banging of large pieces of metal, I find both sounds disturbing but for the indoctrination reasons, not for the dreadful din.

They aren't informed that everyone has got a swiss watch

Could be worse - they could be using semtex and semi automatic weapons as they have done in (ahem) other parts of the world.

Now that would bugger up your weekend lie-in...

Most of the Swiss church clocks are mechanical and that is why they ring out twice a day.
The 2 large weights, one for the clock and one for the chimes, must be wound up into the church tower.
During this time the whole chime program must be played backwards until all the chimes of the past 12 hrs have been played. This takes between 10 and 20 mins depending on the size of the bells.
Today most of the work is done with electro-motoren, but there are still places where it is done by hand.

Salut zamma

I believe it has something to do with the end of the invasion of the ottoman empire in europa.Not sure should have lisend to the taecher

Until the second half of the nineteenth century, 'nobody in Bosnia could even think of bells or bell towers.' Only in 1860 did the Sarajevo priest Fra Grgo Martic manage to get permission from Topal Osman—Pasa to hang a bell at the church in Kresevo. Permission was granted, thought, only on condition that 'at first the bell be rung softly to let the Turks get accustomed to it little by little'. And still the Muslim of Kresevo were complaining, even in 1875, to Sarajevo that 'the Turkish ear and ringing bells cannot coexist in the same place at the same time'; and Muslim women would beat on their copper pots to drown out the noise...on 30 April 1872, the new Serbian Orthodox church also got a bell. But since the...Muslims had threatened to riot, the military had to be called in to ensure that the ceremony might proceed undisturbed >>> I guess its the ottoman turks

Very informative but I've nevef heard chimes in reverse.....what happens if a clock strikes 13?

Reminds me of the BBC Prime programme about how they forge, test, transport and install the bells. Very complicated.

I went up a hill in Como a few years ago and the church bell chime arrangement was very unorthdox, like something out of a 1960's Italian horror movie.

7am get out of bed 11am is so the mother know in one hour the kids coming home for lunch.

Noticed you are now back in the UK. When you move back, have the ideal home lined up for you. My partner was there 4 years ago. It was very near the church and park. The whole house used to shake from the bell ringings, that went on every 15 mins. Believe they finally toned it down a bit after 11pm and before 5am. on top of the street cleaners were around every day, early morning, even if no rubbish on those roads. To be double sure in case you found it too quiet, in the park they would cut the grass several times a week with the most noisey machines

notice the date on the post Moggy? ring a bell

anyways for those of yoiu interested http://www.oblatesusa.org/images/Obl...%20We%20MJ.htm

I've been in the UK for a year and a half now (not back, I never lived here before...). I don't get church bells, just ambulance sirens. Oh well. I like nice noise, not obnoxious noise

This happens in France as well, where it's called the "Angélus". Bells ring at 7 am, midday and 7 pm.

From what I was told, it has its roots in the days when everyone worked on the land and didn't have watches, and the ringing was basically to call the men back home from the fields around the village for meal times. The tradition still lives on in rural areas, though one suspects that nowadays they already know what the time is from their iPhones...

I use the bells to know when I need to leave to get to work on time. The bells ring like crazy from 10 minutes to 9am for 5 minutes. If they stop ringing I know i'm late.

They ring here at 7pm on a Friday night to announce the week-end- formerly to remind everybody that the week-end is different and that behaviour has to be adjusted accordingly and Church service not to be missed.
I have a 16C document here reminding all at what is or not allowed on a Sunday - it is very interesting.

Yes, and it is called the UK - and peels go on for hours (I don't mind, if I did I wouldn't have bought a flat next to a Church where they do so twice weekly + all the Services- as a buyer/renter, you are responsible for doing a bit of research first, no?).