Popish Plot Popish Plot The Popish Plot was a fictitious conspiracy concocted by Titus Oates that between 1678 and 1681 gripped the Kingdoms of England and Scotland in anti-Catholic hysteria. Oates alleged that there was an extensive Catholic conspiracy to assassinate Charles II, accusations that led to the executions of at least 22 men and precipitated the Exclusion Bill Crisis. Eventually Oates's intricate web of accusations fell apart, leading to his arrest and conviction for perjury. The fictitious Popish Plot must be understood against the background of the English Reformation and the subsequent development of a strong anti-Catholic sentiment among the mostly
Popish Plot there might be a plot of some sort (otherwise, Kenyon argues, he would not have given these two very obscure men a private audience). Charles told Kirkby to present Tonge to Thomas Osborne, Lord Danby, Lord High Treasurer, then the most influential of the King's ministers. Tonge then lied to Danby, saying that he had found the manuscript but did not know the author. As Kenyon points out, the government took seriously even the remotest threat to the King's life or well-being – in the previous spring a Newcastle housewife had been investigated by the Secretary of State simply for