Halloween is just around the corner. You've probably already enjoyed some overpriced Halloween candy or are hunting for that perfect Halloween costume. But where did these customs come from? Why do we put on silly costumes and go door-to-door begging for candy on the night of October 31st?
Around 2,000 years ago, the Celts, which were Celtic speaking people in Europe, celebrated a festival called "Samhain" to celebrate their new year on November 1st marking the beginning of Winter. 2,000 years ago, winter meant the possibility of death. They believed that the night of October 31st meant that the line between life and death became blurred and that ghosts came to earth.
As a celebration, Druids built bonfires and sacrificed animals and other sacred things to the spirits. While doing this, they took the skins of those animals and wore them as costumes to ward off unwanted spirits. (Disgusting, right? Imagine if we did that now!)
About 600 years later, ironically on my birthday, May 13th, All Martyrs Day was celebrated because the pope at the time dedicated the Rome Pantheon in honor of Christian Martyrs and moved the celebration to November 1st. It then spread throughout Europe and evolved into "All Souls Day." All Souls Day was celebrated similarly to Samhain. It was also called "All-Hallows Eve" and therefore evolved to what it is today, Halloween.
This then moved to America. It was slightly less disgusting in America than when it was in Europe. They would put on plays to tell stories of the dead and play tricks on each other to celebrate. Ever wonder where the tradition of carving pumpkins came from? People started carving turnips, which, morbidly, look very similar to human heads. They tried to make their own versions of "Stingy Jack" an Irish myth.
To summarize the myth of Stingy Jack: he invited the Devil to get a drink with him. Following his name, Stingy Jack didn't want to pay the bill so he convinced the Devil to turn himself into a coin that he could use to pay for his drink. He then took that coin and put it next to a cross that prevented the Devil from turning him back to himself. He told the Devil that he would let him go if he did not claim his soul when he dies. The Devil agreed but when Jack died, he couldn't go to heaven nor hell, so he was sent into the night with burning coal to light his way. It is said he put his coal into a turnip and has been roaming the earth ever since, so people would carve their own turnips to scare him away. It then got the name "Jack-o-lantern" to resemble Stingy Jack's turnip lantern.
Halloween today is obviously much different than its origins. Today, Halloween is commercialized for companies to make a ton of money, in which they succeed in doing. For this Halloween 2017, it is estimated that Americans will spend $9.1 Billion Dollars on candy! That's a lot of candy!
So this Halloween, when you're putting on your costume, carving your pumpkin, and going to that party, think about the origins of Halloween and be thankful that you don't celebrate it in its origins!
Oh... and speaking of thankful, get ready for Thanksgiving! It's not too far away!
Have a spooky Halloween!
