Guy Fawkes was a religious nut really , it was all down to religion as the Catholics and Protestants tried to gain dominance in England.

England in the 1500's witnessed religious seeds of discontent. Protestant was pitched against Catholic from the throne right down to the peasant. It was the reign of Henry VIII, a catholic monarch, who wrote frequent condemnations of Protestantism.

Henry was happy with the Catholic faith until the Pope refused to grant him a divorce from his first wife Catherine of Aragon. It was at this point that Henry turned his back on Catholicism and the church of Rome. In the years after Henry's death, the throne remained a see-saw of religion. Henry's successor Edward VI, drove the Anglican church towards Protestantism, whilst his sister, Mary I tried to bring back the Catholic through severe persecution of the protestants.

When Elizabeth I ascended the throne, things changed again.

Elizabeth feared a Catholic Europe and embarked on a course of persecution towards Catholics within her own country. When James VI took Elizabeth's place it was hoped this persecution would cease, James however reintroduced Elizabeth's policies. Within a few weeks of this event, five men,faithful to the Catholic cause, one of whom was Guy Fawkes, met and swore an oath, to blow up James and the Houses of Parliament.

The conspirators rented a cellar in the Parliament buildings. It was in this cellar that the men placed 36 barrels of gunpowder.

On the night of the 4th of November, a day before the scheduled blast, Fawkes was caught in the cellar with the gunpowder and arrested. Fawkes was tortured until he revealed the details of the plot and named all involved.