which have been cast to commemorate the cathedral's eight hundred and fiftieth birthday, and to restore the peal's 'landscape of sound' to the eighteenth century, are, in ascending order of tonnage and largitude,
JEAN-MARIE, after Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, Archbishop of Paris and Cardinal Vingt-Trois's predecessor, |
| "...made worthy..." |
MAURICE, after Maurice de Sully who laid the first stone of the present cathedral,
 |
| (Floor-print of the cathedral) |
BENOIT-JOSEPH, after Pope (Emeritus from today onwards, alas) Benedict XVI, Joseph Ratzinger, 
ETIENNE, after St Stephen, the first martyr, to whom the present cathedral's predecessor was consecrated,
MARCEL, after St Marcel, the ninth Bishop of Paris,
DENIS,
after Dennis le Menace, no, St Denis, the first Bishop of Paris, who, having been beheaded on Montmartre, picked up his head and walked to where
now stands the Basilique de Saint-Denis, delivering a sermon as he
walked.
ANNE-GENEVIEVE, after Saints Anne (Mary's mother) and Geneviève (patron of Paris),
GABRIEL, after the Angel Gabriel, 
and MARIE, the buttery-biscuit-bourdon (founded at Asten in the Netherlands).
What a magnificent sight and a fitting tribute to the tremendous cathedral! They will be rung for the first time on the 23rd of March, the eve of Palm Sunday.
All of the bells but Marie were cast at the Cornille-Havard foundry in a Norman town called Villedieu-les-Poêles. Its curious name translates literally as "City-of-God-the-pots-and-pans", and by coincidence I visited it two years ago. It has had copper-work as its main industry for centuries and as well as its bell-foundry still makes and sells metalware. It is delightful and well worth a trip.