|
The Legend of Halloween goes back over 2000 years to the ancient Celts.
Druidic priest regarded the day as the end of the year.
Not only was it their day for celebrating the year's harvest,
but October 31 itself was also the day of the
'Samhain' (pronounced sow-in), a festival for honoring the dead.
In order to appease the wandering spirits they believed roamed at night,
the Celtic priests made fires in which they burned sacrifices,
made charms, and cast spell.
There was a time when people actually feared Halloween.
They believed that on this night spirits would walk the earth,
searching for living bodies to possess.
To discourage this from happening,
people would extinguish the fires in their homes
making them appear as cold and unwelcome as possible.
They would dress as ghouls and ghosts to fool the spirits
into thinking they were alread part of the 'undead'.
The Church tried to Christianize this festival by adapting November 1
as 'All Saints Day,' a day to honor all the saints in heaven.
The term 'Halloween' means the evening before
All Hallows or All Saint's Day.
Celebrations of Halloween came to America with early Irish
and Scottish immigrants.
In old Ireland, wealthy landlords would hand out gifts of food
to their poor tenants at Halloween.
It is believed that the Irish then brught that tradition to America
where it was adopted into what is now 'trick-or-treating.'
In Mexico Halloween is called
''los Dias de los Muertos'
(the day of the dead)
and is more of a celebration of life and one's own ancestry
than a day of fear and terror.
The term WITCH comes from the Saxon term
'wicca' which means 'wise one'.
It is believed that approximately two million people were executed
for practicing witchcraft between 1400 and 1800
the majority of which were women.
The Jack-o-Lantern custom is a folk-tale
about a man named Jack who tricked the Devil.
When Jack died, he was not admitted into heaven or hell.
He was given a single ember to light his way through the darkness.
He placed it in a turnip so it would not blow out.
Of course, in America, since Pumpkins are more abundant,
they replaced the turnip
and thus a new tradition was 'carved'.
The largest pumpkin ever recorded weighed 1131 pounds.
Considering the average pumpkin weighs approximately 5 pound,
we can only imagine the size of that pumpkin pie.
Made by mashing roasted apples in milk,
'lambs wool' is said to be the traditional drink of Halloween.
|
|