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Glite Dictionary
Big Ben

Big Ben

8 3.3
A large bell and clock in the tower at the Houses of Parliament in London
  • proper noun
translation icon : Big Ben
  • We've walked around Westminster and we saw the Abbey, we saw the London Eye, we saw Big Ben, we saw double Decker buses, the London taxi cabs.
  • London's Big Ben
  • Big Ben clock tower
  • Big Ben clock

That's not Buckingham Palace, that's Big Ben, is it not?

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Examples

  • Big Ben stands by the River Thames

    Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969)

  • London advertises Big Ben because you can see it.

    MIT OpenCourseWare

  • How is Big Ben looking tonight?

    Blog text (8)

  • The BBC reported that Big Ben, in order to stay up to date, was going to turn digital.

  • I walked right past Big Ben.

    Fiction book (1995)

  • What's the quickest way from Baker Street to Big Ben?

    Paddington 2 (2017)

  • She looked over at Big Ben, with its long, glowing green fingers.

    Fiction book (1993)

  • And that will mean more slides to sit through on Sundays: Buckingham Palace, the Changing of the Guard, Big Ben.

    Fiction book (1993)

  • How about a lecture on life in a bustling city without hearing some of the typical city sounds: the clanging of the bells on San Francisco's trolley cars or the tolling of Big Ben's chimes in London?

    Academic text (2008)

  • When visiting London, you must take a photo of Big Ben, the iconic clock tower.

Synonyms

clock tower
vsBig Ben
11 2.8

A tall part of a building with a large clock on the outside

is commonly used to mean the famous timepiece and sometimes the structure
bell tower
vsBig Ben
8 3.3

A tall structure, often part of a church or public building, that holds bells

often names the large ringing instrument itself or the surrounding structure
belfry
vsBig Ben
6 8.1

A tower or high part of a building where bells are kept and rung, often in a church

is less common, since the name usually denotes the large instrument or entire structure

Surface Forms

Big Ben main

Morphology

big + Ben

Big Ben is a proper name for a specific bell/clock/tower in London and requires encyclopedic or cultural knowledge; the literal constituents 'big' (large) and 'Ben' (a personal name) do not indicate a clock or landmark. Because the referent is a named entity rather than a compositional phrase, a B1 learner who only knows the constituent words would not be able to derive its meaning.

Etymology

Big Ben may come from a large man called Sir Benjamin Hall who helped put the big bell in place, so people started calling the bell 'Big Ben' after him. Today Big Ben is used for the 'bell', the 'clock', and sometimes the whole 'tower'.