Fawkes Explained
| Fawkes |
| Pronunciation: | Fawks, IPA: pronounced as /[fɔːks]/ |
| Meaning: | Valley or Falcon |
| Region: | British Isles |
| Language: | Norman |
| Variant: | Fakes, Faulks, Faulkes, Fawks, Fawlks, Fawlkes, Foulks, Foulkes, Fowkes |
| Footnotes: | [1] [2] |
Fawkes is a surname of Norman-French origin, first appearing in the British Isles after the Norman Conquest of England in 1066.[1] The surname may be a corruption of the Norman surname Vaux, which means valley. Notably, Guy Fawkes was sometimes recorded as Guy Vaux.[3] An alternative origin for the surname is that it originates from the pre-6th century Germanic given name of Falco (later Faulques) meaning "falcon".[1] The first recorded spelling of the surname in England is that of one Geoffrey Faukes in 1221.[1]
It is also, less frequently, a given name.
People
Surname
- Barbara Fawkes (1914–2002), British nurse and nursing educator
- Francis Fawkes (1721–1777), English poet and translator
- Frederick Fawkes (1870–1936), British Conservative Party politician
- George Fawkes (1903–1967), British admiral
- Guy Fawkes (1570–1606), English revolutionary
- Isaac Fawkes (1675?–1732), English conjurer and showman
- John Fawkes (born 1933), English cricketer
- Marion Fawkes (born 1948), First official female racewalking world champion
- Randol Fawkes (1924–2000), Bahamian civil rights activist, author, musician
- Richard Fawkes (1944–2020), British writer and director
- Wally Fawkes (1924–2023), British-Canadian jazz clarinetist and cartoonist
- Walter Fawkes (1769–1825), British landowner and politician, patron of painter J. M. W. Turner
- Wilmot Fawkes (1846–1926), Royal Navy officer, Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth
Given name
- Fawkes de Breauté, (died 1226), Anglo-Norman soldier who served in the First Barons' War
Pseudonym
- Guido Fawkes, a pseudonym of British right-wing political blogger Paul Staines
Fictional characters
- Jamison Fawkes (aka Junkrat), playable character in the 2016 video game Overwatch
- Darien Fawkes, main character of the television series The Invisible Man
- Fawkes, Dumbledore's phoenix in the Harry Potter books
- Fawkes, on the web series The Guild, portrayed by Wil Wheaton
- Fawkes, a Super Mutant character from the 2008 video game Fallout 3
See also
Notes and References
- Web site: Last name: Fawkes . The Internet Surname Database . 5 November 2011.
- Web site: Fawkes . British Surnames . 14 April 2020.
- Book: Howe, N.G. . 21 February 2019 . Statesmen in Caricature: The Great Rivalry of Fox and Pitt the Younger in the Age of the Political Cartoon . London . Bloomsbury Publishing . 1786736713.
