Every country has a reason to have fireworks sometime throughout the year, right? Tonight is Guy Fawkes Night, also known as Bonfire Night in the UK. It's 8pm on Friday, 2 November. Everywhere, they are shooting fireworks and having bonfires. (They need the bonfires to stay warm while watching fireworks outside in November-just kidding, but I bet it does help warm people up!)
The celebration has religious and political references. It is irreverently referred to as Anti-Christian Day. Not really anti-Christian, more anti-Catholic.
The following is taken from Wikipedia on the history of Guy Fawkes Night.
Guy Fawkes Night originates from the
Gunpowder Plot of 1605, a failed conspiracy by a group of provincial English
Catholics to assassinate the
Protestant King
James I of England and replace him with a Catholic head of state. In the immediate aftermath of the arrest of
Guy Fawkes, caught guarding a cache of explosives placed beneath the
House of Lords, James's Council allowed the public to celebrate the king's survival with bonfires, so long as they were "without any danger or disorder", making 1605 the first year the plot's failure was celebrated. Days before the surviving conspirators were executed, in January 1606 Parliament passed the
Observance of 5th November Act 1605, commonly known as the "Thanksgiving Act". It was proposed by a Puritan Member of Parliament,
Edward Montagu, who suggested that the king's apparent deliverance by divine intervention deserved some measure of official recognition, and kept 5 November free as a day of thanksgiving while in theory making attendance at Church mandatory. A new form of service was also added to the
Church of England's
Book of Common Prayer, for use on 5 November.
Little is known about the earliest celebrations.
Canterbury celebrated 5 November 1607 with 106 pounds of gunpowder and 14 pounds of
match, and three years later food and drink was provided for local dignitaries, as well as music, explosions and a parade by the local militia. Even less is known of how the occasion was first commemorated by the general public, although records indicate that in Protestant
Dorchester a sermon was read, the church bells rung, and bonfires and fireworks lit.
According to historian and author
Antonia Fraser, a study of the earliest sermons preached demonstrates an anti-Catholic concentration "mystical in its fervour". Delivering one of five 5 November sermons printed in
A Mappe of Rome in 1612,
Thomas Taylor spoke of the "generality of his [a papist's] cruelty," which had been "almost without bounds". Such messages were also spread in printed works like Francis Herring's
Pietas Pontifica (republished in 1610 as
Popish Piety), and John Rhode's
A Brief Summe of the Treason intended against the King & State, which in 1606 sought to educate "the simple and ignorant ... that they be not seduced any longer by papists". By the 1620s the Fifth was honoured in market towns and villages across the country, though it was some years before it was commemorated throughout England. Gunpowder Treason Day, as it was then known, became the predominant English state commemoration. Some parishes made the day a festive occasion, with public drinking and solemn processions.{Public drinking and solemn processions? Do those two things really go together? I'm just saying.} Concerned though about James's pro-Spanish foreign policy, the decline of international Protestantism, and Catholicism in general, Protestant clergymen who recognised the day's significance called for more dignified and profound thanksgivings each 5 November.
What unity English Protestants had shared in 1606 began to fade when in 1625 James's son, the future
Charles I, married the Catholic
Henrietta Maria of France. Puritans reacted to the marriage by issuing a new prayer to warn against rebellion and Catholicism, and on 5 November that year, effigies of the pope and the devil were burnt, the earliest such report of this practice and the beginning of centuries of tradition. During Charles's reign Gunpowder Treason Day became increasingly partisan. Between 1629 and 1640 he ruled without Parliament, and he seemed to support
Arminianism, regarded by Puritans like
Henry Burton as a step toward Catholicism. By 1636, under the leadership of the Arminian Archbishop of Canterbury
William Laud, the English church was trying to use 5 November to denounce all seditious practices, and not just popery. Puritans went on the defensive, some pressing for further
reformation of the Church.
Bonfire Night, as it was occasionally known, assumed a new fervour during the events leading up to the
English Interregnum. Although
Royalists disputed their interpretations,
Parliamentarians began to uncover or fear new Catholic plots. Preaching before the House of Commons on 5 November 1644,
Charles Herle claimed that Papists were tunnelling "from Oxford, Rome, Hell, to Westminster, and there to blow up, if possible, the better foundations of your houses, their liberties and privileges". A display in 1647 at
Lincoln's Inn Fields commemorated "God's great mercy in delivering this kingdom from the hellish plots of papists", and included fireballs burning in the water (symbolising a Catholic association with "infernal spirits") and fireboxes, their many rockets suggestive of "popish spirits coming from below" to enact plots against the king. Effigies of Fawkes and the pope were present, the latter represented by
Pluto, Roman god of the underworld.
Following Charles I's execution in 1649, the country's new republican regime remained undecided on how to treat 5 November. Unlike the old system of religious feasts and State anniversaries, it survived, but as a celebration of parliamentary government and Protestantism, and not of monarchy. Commonly the day was still marked by bonfires and miniature explosives, but formal celebrations resumed only with the
Restoration, when
Charles II became king. Courtiers,
High Anglicans and
Tories followed the official line, that the event marked God's preservation of the English throne, but generally the celebrations became more diverse. By 1670 London apprentices had turned 5 November into a fire festival, attacking not only popery but also "sobriety and good order", demanding money from coach occupants for alcohol and bonfires. The burning of effigies, largely unknown to the
Jacobeans, continued in 1673 when Charles's brother, the
Duke of York, converted to Catholicism. In response, accompanied by a procession of about 1,000 people, the apprentices fired an effigy of the
Whore of Babylon, bedecked with a range of papal symbols. Similar scenes occurred over the following few years. In 1677 elements of
Queen Elizabeth's
Accession Day celebration of 17 November were incorporated into the Fifth, with the burning of large bonfires, a large effigy of the pope—his belly filled with live cats "who squalled most hideously as soon as they felt the fire"—and two effigies of devils "whispering in his ear". Two years later, as the
exclusion crisis was reaching its zenith, an observer noted the "many bonfires and burning of popes as has ever been seen". Violent scenes in 1682 forced London's militia into action, and to prevent any repetition the following year a proclamation was issued, banning bonfires and fireworks.
Fireworks were also banned under
James II, who became king in 1685. Attempts by the government to tone down Gunpowder Treason Day celebrations were, however, largely unsuccessful, and some reacted to a ban on bonfires in London (born from a fear of more burnings of the pope's effigy) by placing candles in their windows, "as a witness against Catholicism". When James was deposed in 1688 by
William of Orange—who importantly, landed in England on 5 November—the day's events turned also to the celebration of freedom and religion, with elements of anti-
Jacobitism. While the earlier ban on bonfires was politically motivated, a ban on fireworks was maintained for safety reasons, "much mischief having been done by squibs".
Guy Fawkes Day
William's birthday fell on 4 November, and for orthodox
Whigs the two days therefore became an important double anniversary. William ordered that the thanksgiving service for 5 November be amended to include thanks for his "happy arrival" and "the Deliverance of our Church and Nation". In the 1690s he re-established Protestant rule in Ireland, and the Fifth, occasionally marked by the ringing of church bells and civic dinners, was consequently eclipsed by his birthday commemorations. From the 19th century, 5 November celebrations there became sectarian in nature. Its celebration in Northern Ireland remains controversial, unlike in Scotland, where bonfires continue to be lit in various
Caledonian cities. In England though, as one of 49 official holidays, for the ruling class 5 November became overshadowed by events such as the birthdays of
Admiral Edward Vernon, or
John Wilkes, and under
George II and
George III, with the exception of the
Jacobite Rising of 1745, it was largely "a polite entertainment rather than an occasion for vitriolic thanksgiving". For the lower classes, however, the anniversary was a chance to pit disorder against order, a pretext for violence and uncontrolled revelry. At some point, for reasons that are unclear, it became customary to burn Guy Fawkes in effigy, rather than the pope. Gradually, Gunpowder Treason Day became Guy Fawkes Day. In 1790
The Times reported instances of children "...begging for money for Guy Faux", and a report of 4 November 1802 described how "a set of idle fellows ... with some horrid figure dressed up as a
Guy Faux" were convicted of begging and receiving money, and committed to prison as "idle and disorderly persons". The Fifth became "a polysemous occasion, replete with polyvalent cross-referencing, meaning all things to all men". Lower class rioting continued, with reports in
Lewes of annual rioting, intimidation of "respectable householders" and the rolling through the streets of lit tar barrels. In
Guildford, gangs of revellers who called themselves "guys" terrorised the local population; proceedings were concerned more with the settling of old arguments and general mayhem, than any historical reminiscences. Similar problems arose in
Exeter, originally the scene of more traditional celebrations. In 1831 an effigy was burnt of the new Bishop of Exeter
Henry Phillpotts, a
High Church Anglican and
High Tory who opposed
Parliamentary reform, and who was also suspected of being involved in "creeping popery". A local ban on fireworks in 1843 was largely ignored, and attempts by the authorities to suppress the celebrations resulted in violent protests and several injured constables.
Organised entertainments also became popular in the late 19th century, and 20th-century pyrotechnic manufacturers renamed Guy Fawkes Day as Firework Night. Sales of fireworks dwindled somewhat during the First World War, but resumed in the following peace. At the start of the Second World War celebrations were again suspended, resuming in November 1945. For many families, Guy Fawkes Night became a domestic celebration, and children often congregated on street corners, accompanied by their own effigy of Guy Fawkes. This was sometimes ornately dressed and sometimes a barely-recognisable bundle of rags stuffed with whatever filling was suitable. A survey found that in 1981 about 23 percent of
Sheffield schoolchildren made Guys, sometimes weeks before the event. Collecting money was a popular reason for their creation, the children taking their effigy from door to door, or displaying it on street corners. But mainly, they were built to go on the bonfire, itself sometimes comprising wood stolen from other pyres; "an acceptable convention" that helped bolster another November tradition,
Mischief Night. Rival gangs competed to see who could build the largest, sometimes even burning the wood collected by their opponents; in 1954 the
Yorkshire Post reported on fires late in September, a situation which forced the authorities to remove latent piles of wood for safety reasons. Lately, however, the custom of begging for a "penny for the Guy" has almost completely disappeared. In contrast, some older customs still survive; in
Ottery St Mary men chase each other through the streets with lit tar barrels, and since 1679 Lewes has been the setting of some of England's most extravagant 5 November celebrations, the
Lewes Bonfire.
Generally, modern 5 November celebrations are run by local charities and other organisations, with paid admission and controlled access. Author
Martin Kettle, writing in
The Guardian in 2003, bemoaned an "occasionally nannyish" attitude to fireworks which discourages people from holding firework displays in their back gardens, and an "unduly sensitive attitude" toward the anti-Catholic sentiment once so prominent on Guy Fawkes Night. David Cressy summarised the modern celebration with these words: "the rockets go higher and burn with more colour, but they have less and less to do with memories of the Fifth of November ... it might be observed that Guy Fawkes' Day is finally declining, having lost its connection with politics and religion. But we have heard that many times before."
Nowadays, family bonfire gatherings are much less popular, and many once-large civic celebrations have been given up because of increasingly intrusive health and safety regulations. But 5 November has also been overtaken by a popular festival that barely existed when I was growing up, and that is Halloween ... Britain is not the Protestant nation it was when I was young: it is now a multi-faith society. And the Americanised Halloween is sweeping all before it—a vivid reminder of just how powerfully American culture and American consumerism can be transported across the Atlantic.
