Remember, remember...

So Guy Fawkes night - we all know the story.  Or do we??  It seems to me that what I was taught as a child, and it seems what schoolchildren are still being taught, is a very simplified and to a certain extent, sanitised version of what took place.  This may take more than one post, so here goes - part 1. It's all down to Queen Elizabeth The First - the "virgin queen".  Most unlikely that she was a virgin, but she certainly never married and died childless (at least officially) so on her death, the throne of England would be up for grabs.  The memory of her predecessor's reign (Mary I, known as Bloody Mary for her persecution of Protestants) was still fresh in many people's minds, and so the fact that all three of the obvious contenders for the throne were Catholics (or at the very least Catholic sympathisers) was a problem - to put it mildly. Arguably the one with the best claim was James, son of Mary, Queen of Scots, who was Elizabeth's cousin and would have been the obvious successor, had she not been executed for treason years earlier.  In the months before Elizabeth died, the government negotiated with James, and apparently got assurances from him that he would reign as religiously neutral, and leave such matters to parliament to deal with. On this basis he was offered the throne. He was already King of Scotland - then an independent country - so he became James I of England, whilst still being James VI of Scotland,  And here endeth part 1.