Happy Guy Fawkes Day

Syracuse.com ^ | November 05, 2009 | Josh Shear

[Alex Murphy]

In case you needed an excuse to have a couple of cold ones, burn stuff and light fireworks, look no further. November 5 is Guy Fawkes Day.

On November 5, 1605, England held a celebration for the opening of Parliament. Guy Fawkes tried to spark a revolution by blowing up the building – and the royal family along with it – in what is known as the Gunpowder Plot (PDF) .

The plot was foiled when one of Fawkes's co-conspirators sent a letter to a friend telling the friend to stay away from Parliament that night. The letter was intercepted and Fawkes was found in the basement of Parliament getting ready to light the fuse on several dozen barrels of gunpowder.

He was tortured for a list of his co-conspirators, and was hanged in January of 1606.

Fawkes was born a Protestant but converted to Catholicism at a time when Catholics were persecuted in England. He hoped to incite the country to revolution in an attempt to gain equal (or better) recognition for Catholics (read more from the BBC).

Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated by burning effigies of Fawkes in a communal bonfire, and by setting off Fireworks. A British ex-pat living in Burnsville, Minn., brought the celebration to the town one year.

[Alex Murphy]

Fawkes was born a Protestant but converted to Catholicism at a time when Catholics were persecuted in England. He hoped to incite the country to revolution in an attempt to gain equal (or better) recognition for Catholics.

In 1605, 13 young men planned to blow up the Houses of Parliament in what is now called "the Gunpowder Plot". The Gunpowder Plot came about after Queen Elizabeth I died in 1603. English Catholics, who had been persecuted under her rule, were bitterly disappointed when her successor, James I, who had a Catholic mother, failed to be more tolerant of their religion. Their leader Robert Catesby decided to blow up the Houses of Parliament, hoping to kill the King, the Prince of Wales, and the MPs who were making life difficult for Catholics. Among 13 young men was Guy Fawkes, Britain's most notorious traitor and Roman Catholic convert. He was arrested in Parliament's cellar with 36 barrels of gunpowder. Fawkes was tried, convicted, and executed for treason.

Even now, four hundred years later, the reigning monarch only enters the Parliament once a year for the State Opening of Parliament. And before the opening, according to custom, the Yeomen of the Guard searches the cellars of the Palace of Westminster.

Related threads:
Guy Fawkes in the U.S.
Guy Fawkes’ Day: The significance of November 5th
Jumping off the scaffold [Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot]
‘Master Illusionist’ (Tower of London Is Hallowed for the Blood St. Nicholas Owen Spilled There)
Book bound in skin of executed Jesuit to be auctioned in England
Royal succession law change bid fails
The Act of Settlement is just fine [as a Catholic, this writer is happy with it]
FR keyword: guyfawkes

[Doogle]

[RushIsMyTeddyBear]

[Vanders9]

Darn straight! To the fire with the traitor!

[GeronL]

They burn him in effigy and name a Holiday after him??

Are they bi-polar or something?

[randog]

Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated by burning effigies of Fawkes in a communal bonfire, and by setting off Fireworks.

Sounds like some good, honest fun. Don't forget the beer!

[The Sons of Liberty]

Guy Fawkes tried to spark a revolution by blowing up the building

Where's Guy when you really need him?

[RushIsMyTeddyBear]

There were some kids down the road from me in the UK who always made an effigy every year and sat him on the street corner. I would walk back from the news stand and they would ask, “Penny for the Guy?” You were to throw money into a little box.

I always found it quite strange that the folks are adamantly AGAINST capital punishment.....but celebrate an execution every year.

[agere_contra]

We don’t celebrate Guy Fawke’s execution today. We celebrate explosions and - I like to think - the cool idea of blowing up Parliament.

The fact that there is a ‘Guy’ who is burnt in effigy is a leftover accretion, which makes a useful vehicle for political commentary. Watch out for EU flags wrapped around the heads of this year’s guys!

[Campion]

English Protestants celebrate the failure of a plot to kill James I, and the execution of the plotter.

But Oliver Cromwell, the man who actually did command the killing of James' son and successor, Charles I, was never tried, convicted, or executed for his regicide, and there is no national holiday celebrating his death.

[Campion]

Isn’t it traditional to burn someone else in effigy today, as well?

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

I saw a kid dressed in that costume at my son’s Cub Scout Halloween party. NOW I know who he was supposed to be! I wonder if the kid knows?

[Alex Murphy]

Isn’t it traditional to burn someone else in effigy today, as well?

Like Michael Servetus?

Related threads:
On The Errors of the Trinity, by Michael Servetus
Arminius's Christology

[GeronL]

Weird on several levels.

[Lorica]

Isn’t it traditional to burn someone else in effigy today, as well?

Pope Paul V.

In Sussex, it is a major festival that centres on Lewes necessitating the closure of the town centre. The night also commemorates the Glorious Revolution and 17 local Protestant martyrs that were burnt at the stake during Marian Persecutions by the Catholic Queen Mary I.[14] The night begins with torchlight processions in costume by a number of local bonfire societies and culminates in six separate bonfires where effigies of Guy Fawkes, Pope Paul V and topical personalities are destroyed by firework and flame. The burning of an effigy of Pope Paul V is carried out by the Cliffe Bonfire Society alone and they are barred from marching with the main procession.

And of course, there's this:

A penny loaf to feed the Pope
A farthing o' cheese to choke him.
A pint of beer to rinse it down.
A fagot of sticks to burn him.
Burn him in a tub of tar.
Burn him like a blazing star.
Burn his body from his head.
Then we'll say ol' Pope is dead.
Hip hip hoorah!
Hip hip hoorah hoorah!

[Billthedrill]

Darn it. I forgot, forgot, the Fifth of November...

[Gamecock]

***Don’t forget the beer!***

Not a problem the Brits seem to have.

[Hacksaw]

But Oliver Cromwell, the man who actually did command the killing of James' son and successor, Charles I, was never tried, convicted, or executed for his regicide, and there is no national holiday celebrating his death.

Possibly because England found it a lot easier to simply get rid of murderous Calvinists like Cromwell.

[vladimir998]

That’s EXACTLY what I was thinking.

[vladimir998]

The kid may have been copying that V for Vendetta movie that came out a few years ago. It was based on a graphic novel.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_for_Vendetta