Mary Fritz, age 10, of Norristown, Penn., for her question:

WHEN WAS THE SISTINE CHAPEL BUILT?

The Sistine Chapel is a famous church in the palace of the Vatican of Rome. It was erected by Pope Sixtus IV in 1473.

Chief papal ceremonies take place in the Sistine Chapel. The chapel is also used by cardinals for the voting by which they elect a new pope.

The Sistine Chapel is 134 feet long, 44 feet wide and 85 feet high.

On the Sistine Chapel's walls and ceiling are some of the greatest art masterpieces ever produced in the Western world. Brilliant artists of the early Renaissance decorated the walls with paintings that tell the stories of Moses and Christ. On the ceiling are Biblical stories painted by the great artist Michelangelo in the 1500s.

It took Michelangelo four and a half years to complete the Sistine Chapel's ceiling. It pictures the history of the creation of the world, the fall of man and the flood.

On the wall above the altar is Michelangelo's 60 foot painting called "The Last Judgment." The artist started it when he was 60 years old and he worked on it eight years.