January 6 is the Feast of Epiphany and I thought let me share with you our visits to the Cathedral of Cologne, Germany where the Shrine of the Three Kings is inside gilded and decorated triple sarcophagus. The remains of the Three 'Magi' (Persian) are in there: Merlchior middle aged from Persia, Caspar young European, Balthasar an elderly from Ethiopia. There is a lot of information out there about these biblical figures and millions of people have visited this Shrine in Cologne, Germany.
Here you see the triple gilded sarcophagus with the remains of the Three Magi.
This is the largest reliquary of the Western World.
Because of the value of he gold, pearls and intaglia + the relics it is well protected as you can see.
This visit was in 2005, with our German 'son' as our guide (r) and our Dublin, Georgia friend (l) and me in the center. Husband Pieter took both photos. Here we are standing outside of the Cathedral of Cologne.
It is impossible for capturing this mighty building. The foundation was laid in 1248 and it took over 600 years to complete. Below this post, you find a video about Cologne Cathedral, Germany.
Cologne Cathedral is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
This photo from November 2008, shows more of the LARGEST CHURCH FACADE IN THE WORLD!
To the left is our German 'daughter-in-law', me with little 'granddaughter' and our foster-daughter Anita from Indonesia.
Cologne Cathedral is also the world's tallest Gothic building!
When it got completed in 1880 it was the world's tallest building for 4 years till the Washington Monument in DC, USA did beat it by 4 meters .
Inside of the Cathedral with 'daughter-in-law', 'grandson' and me to the right...
The space inside compares to over 600 houses.
It also houses the world's largest free-swinging Church bell; the Saint Peter's bell weighing a massive 24 tons.
There are a total of 11 bells. You can hear the big Saint Peter's bell and 8 of the 11 bells ringing in two Youtube videos, linked below post.
When I was still in my early 20s I actually did CLIMB up the stairs and here I took this photo by standing on my toes and holding my camera out of the tower. You see the famous bridge over the River Rhine.
They now seem to have a platform at the south tower for standing on and you can reach that with 533 steps. Not at that time...
The Cathedral of Cologne got mostly spared during WWII but it still got damaged.
Dad told me when I returned from climbing its tower that Grandpa, my Godfather and Dad's Father had worked on the renovations after WWII
Yep, I had to rest before moving on.
Wearing my Salzburger rose Dirndl here...
Did you ever visit the Cathedral in Cologne, Germany?
Guess what? Living here in the USA, in the Southeast we MISS those majestic Church bells that always would ring when a wedding is going on, for festivities or for sad days like a funeral...
It was kind of hard adjusting to, when we moved from Europe.
May many more visit here...
Just an example of how vast the Persian Empire used to be during biblical times...
From biblemapper.com
Red Sea ←click link to WorldAtlas showing Ethiopia
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