THE CONSPIRATORS
The initial group of conspirators included the ringleader,
Robert Catesby, together with Thomas Winter, 
Thomas Percy, John Wright, and Guy (or Guido) 
Fawkes. Others later became involved, but it was 
Thomas Percy who eventually took a lease on the 
coal-cellar underneath the House of Lords where the
gunpowder - which Fawkes was to set off - was planted.

Guy Fawkes was in fact a minor figure in the conspiracy. An
ex-mercenary in the Spanish Army, he may have been chosen to
fire the gunpowder because of his skill in siegecraft - or it may simply have been that he was unknown in London, having been abroad for some time.