By the time builders had finished the third of eight planned stories about five years later, the tower’s foundation had begun to settle unevenly on the ground beneath it, a dense mixture of clay, sand and shells. In 1173, construction began on a white marble bell tower for the cathedral complex in Pisa, located between the Arno and Serchio rivers in Tuscany, central Italy. The so-called Leaning Tower of Pisa is one of the most famous buildings in the world, although maybe not for the reasons its original architects would have wanted. And this is why it is one of the 7 Wonders of the World.Pick any day in the Piazza del Duomo in the Italian city of Pisa, and you will undoubtedly spot a bunch of tourists posing for the same photo: hands outstretched towards the cathedral’s conspicuously tilting bell tower, as if they are supporting it with their sheer strength. It played an active role in both human and divine timekeeping with its seven bells – one for each musical note – the largest of which, cast in 1655, weighs a full three and a half tonnes! It is known throughout the world for the beauty of its architecture, for its extraordinary tilt, which makes it an authentic miracle of statics, and for the fact that it stands in the universally renowned Piazza dei Miracoli, of which it is certainly the prize jewel. It is called the Leaning Tower or the Tower of Pisa but actually it was never used for defending the city it is part of the religious complex in the Duomo Square and acts as its bell tower. This is how Giorgio Vasari in his mid-sixteenth-century Le Vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e architetti explained the causes of the “obscure evil” which struck the Tower shortly after work started.
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