Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
Guy Fawkes

Guy Fawkes

4 8.6
An English man who took part in a 1605 plot to blow up Parliament and was put to death
  • proper noun
: Guy Fawkes
  • Every year on November 5th, people in Britain remember Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot.

Examples

  • Every year, people celebrate Guy Fawkes Night with fireworks.

  • The face of Guy Fawkes has become a symbol for protest movements around the world.

  • Historians still debate the true intentions of Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators.

  • The story of Guy Fawkes is taught in many history classes.

  • Guy Fawkes was involved in the infamous Guy Fawkes Plot to destroy the Houses of Parliament in 1605.

  • The celebration of Guy Fawkes Night commemorates the foiling of his plot against King James I.

  • Each November 5th, people remember Guy Fawkes and the failed attempt to assassinate the king.

Surface Forms

Guy Fawkes main

Morphology

Guy + Fawkes

This is a proper name for a historical person and event, so its meaning (the conspirator associated with the Gunpowder Plot) is not compositionally built from the constituent tokens. Even if a learner knows 'guy' as a common noun, that knowledge does not allow them to infer the specific historical referent or the associated event, so a B1 learner would not be able to derive the MWE meaning from the parts.

Etymology

Guy Fawkes is the name of a man who took part in the 1605 Gunpowder Plot to blow up Parliament. He was caught and executed, and each November 5th people in Britain remember him with bonfires and fireworks, so his name now refers to the historical conspirator and is also used as a symbol of 'protest' and 'rebellion'.