On saturday 25th of August i desided to take a visit to the most important landmark of my city of birth Amersfoort in the Netherlands.
With a hight of 98.33 (not taken the windfane in account) meters its the third highest churchtower in the Netherlands.
History of the tower.
In the year 1444 a girl from the nabouring village Nijkerk threw a statue of the blessed virgian Mary in the city moat, because she finds the statue to ugly for the abbey where she wanted to be Nun.
On Cristmas eve a young girl called Margriet Alberts recieved 3 visions of the virgian Mary to retreve the statue.
When she did vind the statue (unscaved) she took it home with her, and soon miracels start to happen.
People who were ill got better, and candles that were lit besides the statue never burnt down.
Soon a pelgrimage took place, everybody in the Netherlands wanted to see the statue ( and with all the pelgrims came a lot of money).
From this money the tower could be built.
The build started somewhere around 1450 and ended in 1470.
But because the Bishop lived in the city of Utrecht, he desided that the tower should not be higher than the Dom tower in Utrecht (the highest in the country 104.3m).
The tower resembles the Virgian Mary holding the baby Jesus Christ.
In 1787 a disaster happend, the protestants used the church as a secret gunpowder storage, a big explosion destroyed the church and killed 47 people, but the tower remains.
The tower is also famous for its bells, there are 2 carillions with 35 and 58 bells (the most in the Netherlands).
There are also 7 big bells in the tower wich have a total weight of more than 7.000 kg.
Here are some photo's i took from inside the tower.
In the tower you can find old grafitty.
And when you are at the top you can see more the 40km away.
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