Cathedrals are more than religious monuments or the seat of a bishop. They are deep repositories of history, art, politics, and culture—many of them with roots that stretch back into time in a way that’s nearly impossible to imagine. The Cologne Cathedral in Germany, for example, was founded in the 13th century and took hundreds of years (600, to be exact) to construct. These iconic buildings are landmarks and tourist attractions, and some are so gorgeously and intricately constructed that we have to wonder at the imagination and skill of the engineers and craftsmen who created them. Read on to take a look at some of these soaring beauties from around the world.

St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans

Canterbury Cathedral, Kent, England

Washington National Cathedral, Washington, D.C.

Westminster Abbey, London, UK

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, Los Angeles

Catedral de Sevilla, Spain

Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Chartres, France

St. Basil’s Cathedral, Moscow

St. Patrick’s Cathedral, New York

Florence Cathedral, Italy

St. Paul’s Cathedral, London

Santiago de Compostela Cathedral, Galicia, Spain

Kölner Dom, Cologne, Germany

Duomo di Milano, Italy

Alexander Nevksy Cathedral, Sofia, Bulgaria

La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona, Spain

Saint Sophia’s Cathedral, Kiev, Ukraine

Bourges Cathedral, Bourges, France

Palermo Cathedral, Sicily, Italy

St. Charles Cathedral, Vienna

Salisbury Cathedral, Salisbury, England

York Minster, England

Mexico City Metropolitan Cathedral, Mexico

St. Vitus Cathedral, Prague, Czech Republic

Basilica San Marco, Venice, Italy

Cathedral of Brasília, Brasília, Brazil

Nidarosdomen, Trondheim, Norway

Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey

Metropolitan Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, New York
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Kris Collingridge
Kris Collingridge is MediaFeed’s syndication strategist. She has worked as a print and digital journalist and editor for nearly 20 years. She was arts & entertainment editor at Seattle-based news magazine ParentMap, then a producer and editor at MSN, where she drove audience engagement as programmer of the Travel section.