The spire which collapsed was a reconstruction built during the restoration in the mid-19th Century. The Cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris, Restored by Eugène-Emm

The spire which collapsed was a reconstruction built during the restoration in the mid-19th Century. The Cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris, Restored by Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc and Jean Baptiste Lassus -- http://www.victorianweb.org/art/architecture/vld/3.html http://www.victorianweb.org/art/architecture/vld/3.html "The Commission on Historical Monuments approved most of Viollet-le-Duc's plans, but rejected his proposal to remove the choir built under Louis XIV. Viollet-le-Duc himself turned down a proposal to add two new spires atop the towers, arguing that such a monument "would be remarkable but would not be Notre Dame de Paris". Instead, he proposed to rebuild the original medieval spire and bell tower over the transept, which had been removed in 1786 because it was unstable in the wind." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eug%C3%A8ne_Viollet-le-Duc#Notre-Dame_de_Paris https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eug%C3%A8ne_Viollet-le-Duc#Not...