11/12/2022
Was very lucky to go on a tour of the Bell Tower in Hexham Abbey recently. The sequences used to ring the bells relies on the mathematics of permutations. For example, with 4 bells there are 4x3x2x1= 24 possible orders (permutations) in which to ring the 4 bells. Each one is called a change. One goal is to perform an extent - where every possible change is rung. For 3 bells this is 6 changes starting and ending with the order 123. A clever technique is used to transform the six changes of 3 bells into the 24 changes of four bells. Hexham Abbey has 10 bells, which gives just over 36 million changes! For more information about the mathematics of bell ringing, Google Plus magazine and ringing-changes.
