While the festival is a mainstay of the autumn season, its origins provide a fascinating insight into pagan history and practices.
Halloween, or Hallowe’en, is celebrated on the evening of October 31st. Festive activities include trick-or-treating, bonfire displays, fancy dress parties and ghost tours. Halloween is celebrated in several countries of the Western world.
Halloween has its origins in the ancient pagan festival known as Samhain. Samhain is a festival celebrating the end of the harvest season. Traditionally, the festival was a time used by ancient pagans to take stock of supplies and slaughter their livestock in preparation for winter.
The ancient Gaels believed that on October 31st, the boundary between the living and the deceased dissolved, and the dead become dangerous for the living by causing problems such as sickness or damaged crops. The festivals would frequently involve bonfires, into which bones of slaughtered livestock were thrown. Costumes and masks were worn in an attempt to mimic the evil spirits and confuse them.
Origins of the Name
The term Halloween is shortened from All Hallows' Even as it is the eve of All Hallows Day, or All Saints’ Day. It was a day of religious festivities in various northern European Pagan traditions, until Popes Gregory III and Gregory IV moved the old Christian feast of All Saints' Day from May 13th.
In the ninth century, the Church measured the day as starting at sunset, in accordance with the Florentine calendar. Although All Saints' Day is now considered to occur one day after Halloween, the two holidays were, at that time, celebrated on the same day.
Liturgically, the Church traditionally celebrated that day as the Vigil of All Saints, and, until 1970, a day of fasting as well. Like other vigils, it was celebrated on the previous day if it fell on a Sunday, although secular celebrations of the holiday remained on the 31st. The Vigil was suppressed in 1955, but was later restored in the post-Vatican II calendar.
Halloween imagery and sociological tradition
The carved pumpkin lit by a candle is Halloween's most prominent symbol. Originating in Europe, these lanterns were first carved from a turnip or swede. Believing that the head was the most powerful part of the body containing the soul, the Celts used the head of the vegetable to ward off evil spirits. Many families that celebrate Halloween carve a pumpkin into a frightening or comical face and place it on their doorstep after dark.
The imagery surrounding Halloween is largely an amalgamation of the Halloween season itself, stemming from a century of commercialisation at the hands of film makers and artists. Halloween imagery tends to involve death, black magic, or the supernatural in some form or another. Typical characters include witches, black cats, skeletons, mummies and spiders.
Traditional Halloween Activities
There are several games traditionally associated with Halloween parties. The most common is dunking or bobbing for apples, in a tub or a large basin of water. Participants must use their teeth to remove an apple from the basin. Fancy dress and trick-or-treating are also popular activities at this time.
Because the holiday comes in the wake of the annual apple harvest, toffee apples are a common Halloween treat made by rolling whole apples in sugar syrup, and sometimes topping them with nuts until they set hard.
Source:
Higginbotham, B. Christian Holy-days Versus Christianized Pagan Celebrations.G.E.M. Publications (1992) ASIN: B0006RXJW8
Jen Syrkiewicz - Jen is a writer based in York, UK. She has many years of experience in the communications field, and specialises in Blog Writing and Blog ...
