Every year on 5 November, bonfires are lit and fireworks are set off across Britain to mark Bonfire Night, or Guy Fawkes Night. The tradition dates back more than 400 years to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, one of the most famous attempted acts of political violence in British history.
The story is usually reduced to Guy Fawkes being caught beneath Parliament with barrels of gunpowder. The events behind it were rather more complicated. The UK Parliament's history of the Gunpowder Plot provides a detailed account of the plot, its background and its discovery.
England after the Reformation
The Gunpowder Plot took place against a background of decades of religious and political conflict.
Following the English Reformation, Catholics faced increasing restrictions on their ability to practise their religion. Under Elizabeth I, Catholic priests were regarded with particular suspicion and recusants, those who refused to attend Church of England services, could face substantial fines.
When Elizabeth died in 1603, the English throne passed to James VI of Scotland, who became James I of England. Some Catholics hoped the new King might adopt a more tolerant approach.
When these hopes faded, a small group decided that more drastic action was necessary.
The plot
The driving force behind the conspiracy was Robert Catesby, a Catholic gentleman from Warwickshire.
In May 1604, Catesby met Thomas Winter, John Wright, Thomas Percy and Guy Fawkes in London and proposed an attack on the opening of Parliament.
Their plan was to blow up the House of Lords during the State Opening. The King would be present, together with members of the royal family and many of the country's leading political and religious figures.
The conspirators hoped that killing so much of the country's leadership in a single explosion would create an opportunity for an uprising. Part of the plan involved seizing James's young daughter, Princess Elizabeth, and using her as the figurehead of a new regime.
Guy Fawkes was recruited because of his military experience. Born in York in 1570, he had spent years fighting in continental Europe and had experience with gunpowder. There is a useful biography of Guy Fawkes on the UK Parliament website.
The conspirators eventually acquired an undercroft beneath the House of Lords. By the summer of 1605, 36 barrels of gunpowder had been stored there.
Fawkes was given responsibility for guarding the gunpowder and setting it alight.
The Monteagle Letter
The plot began to unravel in October 1605.
William Parker, Lord Monteagle, received an anonymous letter warning him not to attend the opening of Parliament. The identity of the person who sent the letter has never been established with certainty.
Monteagle passed the warning to the authorities.
Despite knowing that their plan might have been discovered, the conspirators decided to continue.
On the evening of 4 November, the buildings around Parliament were searched. Later that night Sir Thomas Knyvett carried out a further search.
Fawkes, who was using the name John Johnson, was discovered along with the gunpowder and arrested.
The Parliamentary Archives still hold the House of Commons Journal recording the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot.
The National Archives also has a collection of original documents relating to the Gunpowder Plot, including contemporary records that allow the story to be explored through surviving evidence.
What happened to Guy Fawkes?
Fawkes initially refused to identify his fellow conspirators.
He was taken to the Tower of London and interrogated. James I authorised the use of torture and, over the following days, Fawkes provided information about the conspiracy.
Meanwhile, Catesby and several of the other plotters fled London and attempted to continue with their plans for an uprising.
It came to nothing.
The authorities caught up with them at Holbeach House in Staffordshire on 8 November. Catesby, Thomas Percy and the Wright brothers were killed. Others were captured and taken to London.
The surviving conspirators were tried for high treason in January 1606.
They were found guilty and sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered.
Guy Fawkes was executed on 31 January 1606.
The first Bonfire Night
The tradition of marking 5 November began almost immediately.
Bonfires were lit after news spread that the King had survived, and Parliament subsequently passed the Observance of 5th November Act in 1606.
An annual service of thanksgiving was established to commemorate the failure of the plot.
For generations, church services were held on 5 November and the anniversary became part of the national calendar.
Outside the churches, people developed their own ways of marking the occasion.
Bonfires were lit, bells were rung and fireworks became part of the celebrations.
Effigies were also burned. These did not always represent Guy Fawkes. In earlier periods the Pope and other unpopular political or religious figures could find themselves represented on top of the bonfire.
Over time, however, Fawkes became the figure most closely associated with the night.
Penny for the Guy
By the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the Fifth of November had become a major popular celebration.
Children made figures of Guy Fawkes from old clothes stuffed with straw, newspaper or rags. They wheeled them around towns and villages asking passers-by for a "penny for the Guy".
The money collected could then be spent on fireworks.
Bonfires were built on village greens, open land and sometimes directly in the streets. Fireworks, torches, costumes and processions became increasingly common.
The celebrations could also be unruly.
Street fires, fireworks and large crowds regularly brought Bonfire celebrations into conflict with local authorities. Attempts to control the festivities were not always welcomed, and in some places Bonfire became associated as much with defiance of authority as with remembering the events of 1605.
In much of Britain these older customs gradually faded. Municipal firework displays replaced street bonfires, while changing attitudes towards safety brought an end to many informal celebrations.
There is one part of the country, however, where the older Bonfire tradition developed into something much larger.