Historic Halloween

HISTORIC HALLOWEEN

(Excerpts from Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween)

Since I love, love, LOVE Halloween, I wanted to post some info about how it all got started. The wiki page link below gives info about Halloween customs in other countries but for my purposes, I only included Ireland, because that’s where it all began:

“Halloween has its origins in the ancient Celtic festival known as Oíche Shamhna(pron: ee-hah how-nah), literally “Samhain Night” or just Samhain (Irish pronunciation: [ˈsˠaunʲ]. The festival of Samhain is a celebration of the end of the harvest season in Gaelic culture, and is sometimes regarded as the “Celtic New Year”. Traditionally, the festival was a time used by the ancient pagans to take stock of supplies and slaughter livestock for winter stores. The ancient Gaels believed that on October 31, now known as Halloween, the boundary between the living and the dead dissolved, and the dead actually could become dangerous for the living by causing problems such as sickness or damaged crops.”

[I read a book recently called Haunted and Bewitched Ireland by Bob Curran. He asserts that in Ireland ghosts were (are) commonplace. People often came back from the dead to watch over family members or property, a shoemaker might return to finish a job, a mother who died in childbirth might come back to try and reclaim her child, a jealous man might continue to chase the ghost of a woman he lusted after but alas, killed her.  The book is full of these stories and the Irish people, young and old still tell tales of haunted castles, estates, woods and city streets. Below is a link on Amazon if you are interested in the book.]
http://www.amazon.com/Haunted-Bewitched-Ireland-August-2008/dp/B001ERN9MY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1224379388&sr=1-1
[ For those of you who are interested in MORE...I include in my pages, a listing of Irish Ghost stories, please feel free to add any books you particularly like and want to share!]

Halloween Costumes:

“Celtic Festivals would frequently involve bonfires, into which bones of slaughtered livestock were thrown. These large communal bonfires would also be lit to ward off evil spirits. Halloweenwas perceived as the night during which the division between the world of the living and the otherworld was blurred and the spirits of the dead and inhabitants from the underworld were able to walk free on the earth, so it was necessary to dress as a spirit or otherworldly creature when venturing outdoors to blend in and gradually evolved into trick-or-treating because children would knock on their neighbours’ doors, in order to gather fruit, nuts, and sweets for the Halloween festival. Salt was sprinkled in the hair of children to protect against evil spirits.”

[I wonder if this is where the superstition of throwing salt over your shoulder came from...I do know that salt was at one point, was very valuable, so maybe it was considered lucky if you had some.]

Halloween in Ireland: Present Day

“Irish children typically have a week-long Mid-term break from school that coincides with Halloween which falls on the 31st of October. On Halloween night adults and children dress up as creatures from the underworld (e.g., ghosts, ghouls, zombies, witches and goblins), light bonfires, and enjoy spectacular fireworks displays – in particular, the city of Derry is home to the largest organized Halloween celebration on the island, in the form of a street carnival and fireworks display. It is also common for fireworks to be set off for the entire month preceding Halloween, as well as a few days after.

[Imagine having a break from school right around Halloween, how awesome!]

“Irish homes are frequently adorned with turnips carved into scary faces; lights or candles are sometimes placed inside the carvings to provide an eerie effect.”

[Good guess as to where the pumpkin carving tradition got started...]

The traditional Halloween cake in Ireland is the barmbrack, which is a fruit bread. Barmbrack is the centre of this Irish custom. The “Halloween Brack” traditionally contained various objects baked into the bread and was used as a sort of fortune-telling game. In the barmbrack were: a pea, a stick, a piece of cloth, a small coin (originally a silver sixpence) and a ring. Each item, when received in the slice, was supposed to carry a meaning to the person concerned: the pea, the person would not marry that year; the stick, (“to beat one’s wife with”), meant one would have an unhappy marriage or constantly argue; the cloth or rag, one would have bad luck or be poor; the coin, one would enjoy good fortune or be rich; and the ring, one would be married within the year. Commercially produced barmbracks for the Halloween market still include a toy ring.

Games are often played, such as bobbing for apples or peanuts and/or other nuts and fruit and sometimes some small coins are placed in a basin of water. The apples and nuts would float, but the coins, which sink, are a bigger challenge.  In this game everyone takes turns catching as many items possible using only their mouths. In some households, the coins are embedded in the fruit for the children to “earn” as they catch each apple. Another common game involves the hands-free eating of an apple hung on a string attached to the ceiling. Games of divination are also played at Halloween, but are becoming less popular.

[For those of us who love Halloween, I think it's interesting to explore the genesis as well as to explore yesteryear's customs and see how they have changed.]

Just a thought I caught flying by…what do you think?

~ by veritas07 on October 19, 2008.