HALLOWEEN TRADITION - FOLKLORE
Autumn sees the celebration of 2 festivals - Harvest and Halloween, one Christian and one Pagan. Hundreds of years before Christ was born, Samhain was a Celtic celebration, marking the end of summer and the beginning of the new year, on 1 November. During Samhain, the Irish Celts believed that the spirits of those who had died the previous year came back on that night to look for living bodies to possess. Villagers dressed up in ghoulish costumes and paraded around villages in order to scare away the spirits. Belief in spirits began to wane, but many children continued to play-act the part of evil spirits to be appeased, asking for treats from house to house. About 700 A.D. the Church decided to combat this festival by replacing it with a celebration of eternal life and honouring saints who had modelled the Christian life. 1 November was called All Saints Day, All Souls Day or All Hallowed Day. The evening before was called "All Hallows Eve," and soon shortened to Halloween.

Things that go bump in the night… The 31 October is also known as Halloween - that day of the year when we think of ghosts, ghouls, pumpkins and 'trick or treating'. But where do all these customs come from? In Great Britain in particular, the pagan Celts celebrated the Day of the Dead on Halloween. The spirits supposedly rose from the dead and, in order to attract them, food was left on the doors. To scare off the evil spirits, the Celts wore masks. When the Romans invaded the Britain, they embellished the tradition with their own, which is the celebration of the harvest and honoring the dead. These traditions were then passed on to the United States.

Halloween was originally called All Hallows’ Eve which means the evening before All Saints’ Day. "Hallow" is an Old English word for "saint".This was shortened to Halloween and finally to Halloween.

Halloween stems from the ancient celebrations of the Celtic New Year. The end of summer and beginning of winter was known in Gaelic as Samhain (pronounced 'sow'inn'), and it marks the beginning of the year for most Pagans. This was thought of as the turn of the year, when the last harvest took place, and fires were extinguished and relit. People thought of this as a magical time, when the boundaries between this world and the next were dissolved, allowing the dead to return to earth, and for people to foresee their futures. It was also regarded as a time of mischief and trickery when pranks would be played and roles reversed.

The tradition of Halloween began way back in the fifth century BC by the Irish Celts, who organised their year according to the agricultural calendar and marked the transition from one year to the next on October 31. The story goes that during the transition spirits would return to earth, looking for living bodies to possess for the following year. The Celts would then dress up in ghoulish costumes and parade around the community to frighten them away.

Years later, the tradition of trick-or-treating is thought to have grown from a ninth century European custom, souling, when early Christians would make house calls begging for soul cakes. It was thought that even strangers could help a soul's passage to heaven by saying prayers, so, in exchange for a cake they promised to pray for the donors' deceased relatives.

In the past, hundreds of years ago, people thought that the night of Halloween (All Hallows Eve, as it was called long ago) was a very dangerous time. During this festival, they believed, witches' magical powers were at their strongest, and the dead could enter our world and, if they wanted to, attack people and their animals.

The Austrian town of Retz, not far from Vienna, holds an annual Halloween festival, complete with pumpkins and a Halloween-Umzug (?Halloween pageant?), and the region around Retz has become known for its annual pumpkin harvest.

As people have become less superstitious, Halloween is now a time for parties, halloween dressing up, halloween fancy dress costumes and halloween games.Nowadays, most people still enjoy the traditions of Halloween, especially for children's parties.

Halloween Fancy Dress Costumes Why not dress us as a vampire - or a witch. Put on a halloween skeleton costume, a witches costume or simply pop on a skull halloween mask. Click here to view Halloween Party Supplies & Halloween Fancy Dress Costumes & Accesories

Halloween Pooky Night
Halloween is also called Pooky Night in some parts of Ireland, presumably named after the pookah, a mischievous spirit.

Halloween Combing the Hair
It is said that another halloween custom is for a girl to comb her hair in front of a mirror in the name of the devil and to see her future husband. This was a slightly sinister element in a lot of the older and more traditional games.

Halloweeen - Black Cats - Unluck or Lucky?
If a black cat crosses your path it is a sign of good luck. The idea that anything that is a little bit unusual like a completely all black cats tended to attract beliefs such as good luck or bad luck to itself. Very often depending on the part of the country you were in or depending on the individual you happened to be talking to the belief might be good luck or bad luck.

Halloween Ghosts & Haunted Houses
There was a very strong belief that the dead came back from abroad on Halloween night so for that reason a lot of stories were made up about ghosts and ghouls returning. Haunted houses come from the thought that since it was the beginning of darkness and winter there were more supernatural manifestations than in the middle of summer when you only get a couple of hours of darkness every night. The feast of Halloween is very much a festival of the dead traditionally in Ireland and that is where ghosts and haunted houses enter into the halloween stories.

Why we celebrate Halloween
The last night of October was the eve of Samhain, when the Celts (the ancient inhabitants of Great Britain) celebrated their New Year. It is therefore a night when there is supposed to be a gap between our world and the world of the supernatural and the dead.

Fire has always played an important part in Halloween. Fire was very important to the Celts as it was to all early people. In the old days people lit bonfires to ward away evil spirits and in some places they used to jump over the fire to bring good luck. Now we light candles in pumpkin lanterns.

Halloween - Trick - Or Treat
Trick or Treat has been thought to have come from a ninth century European custom called "souling". Beggars or early Christians would go from house to house begging for "soul cakes" made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars received, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. At the time, it was believed that the dead remained in limbo for a time after death, and that prayer, even by strangers, could guarantee a soul's passage to heaven.It was thought that even strangers could help a soul's passage to heaven by saying prayers, so, in exchange for a cake they promised to pray for the donors' deceased relatives. The traditional phrase that the children use is: "Trick or Treat!" This means, "Give us a nice snack to eat (= a treat) or we'll do something bad to you (= play a trick on you)!".

Halloween - Fancy Dress
On the day of Halloween, children put on scary masks and fancy dress costumes of frightening supernatural creatures such as ghosts, monsters, witches or skeletons.

Halloween - Traditional Games
After dark, children may go to a Halloween party and play a traditional game. One game is called "ducking for apples". In this game, people have to try to get apples out of a bucket full of water without using their hands (only their teeth!).

Halloween Games - Bobbing for apples
This started out as a bit of simple fortune-telling like catching the bride's bouquet at a wedding. People would try to bite into apples floating in a vat or hanging from string - the first to bite the appple would be the next to marry.

A day to honour Pomona the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. An apple is the symbol of Pomona, so this could explain the halloweeen tradition of bobbing for apples - whoever bit into an apple first, would be married first the next year. Halloween parties often consisted of various games, for instance 'Dooking fur aiples' where the children had to bite apples floating in a basin of water, once they had one by the teeth they could retreive and obtain it. Sometimes flour would be sprinkled on the surface of the water.
For younger children a more modern game is 'Forkin fur aiples', an easier task, where the children stood on a chair and held a fork handle in their teeth, taking aim, they would release it into the basin of apples and water and retreive and keep any apple they so skewered. Another game was 'treacle scones' where children had to eat a scone covered in treacle hanging on a piece of string.

Halloween - Pumpkins - Jack-0-Lantern The Jack-o-Lantern custom is believed to come from Irish folklore. The turnip lantern is the festival light for Halloween and is the ancient symbol of a damned soul. As the tale is told, a man named Jack, who was notorious as a joker and trickster, tricked the devil into climbing a tree. Jack then carved an image of a cross in the tree’s trunk, trapping the devil up the tree. Jack made a deal with the devil that, if he would never tempt him again, he would promise to let him down the tree.

According to the folk tale, after Jack died, he was denied entrance to Heaven because of his evil ways, but he was also denied access to Hell because he had tricked the devil. Instead, the devil gave him a single ember to light his way through the frigid darkness. The ember was placed inside a hollowed-out turnip to keep it glowing longer.

The Irish used turnips as their “Jack’s lanterns” originally. But when the immigrants came to America, they found that pumpkins were far more plentiful than turnips.So the Jack-o-Lantern in America became a hollowed-out pumpkin, lit with a candle instead of an ember.damned soul.

One story says that the Irish would carve out turnips or beets as lanterns to represent the souls of the dead hence the turnip lanterns.
Another tale tells of a scoundrel called Jack who one dark night tricked the Devil into climbing an apple tree. Once the Devil was in the tree tops, Jack carved a cross on the trunk of the tree so the Devil couldn't climb down. Jack then said he would only let the Devil out of the tree if he promised not to claim his soul when he died. Wanting to be back in his own realm the Devil agreed to Jack's demand. Many years later when Jack died, his life of bad deeds stopped his entry to heaven. The Devil would not give him entry to hell either, because of the bargain made many years earlier. But the Devil took pity on Jack and gave him a glowing coal to light his way. Jack put this in a lantern, which he carved from a pumpkin.

Halloween Party Ideas
Design a pumpkin - give each child a circular/oval piece of orange paper (we usually use sugar paper), then let each child's imagination run wild by letting them design their own faces with black markers or felt tips. Some of the results are quite gruesome! Then carefully cut out the black areas in the faces and replace this with 1 sheet of black tissue paper (stuck to the back of the paper). These faces can be stuck up on the window on Halloween with a light or candle behind them - the effect is spooky!

Halloween lanterns - If you purchase some cheap tea-light holders. Then using glass paints, paint each one orange then added faces with black pen - other patterns such a witches faces/hats, black cats or spiders can be used too. If you don't have glass paints try using orange tissue paper glued to the glass with P.V.A. glue. On Halloween just place a tea-light into the holder and it glows all night.

Witch's Broomsticks
The witch is a central symbol of Halloween. The name comes from the Saxon wica, meaning wise one. When setting out for a Sabbath, witches rubbed a sacred ointment onto their skin. This gave them a feeling of flying, and if they had been fasting they felt even giddier. Some witches rode on horseback, but poor witches went on foot and carried a broom or a pole to aid in vaulting over streams. In England when new witches was initiated they were often blindfolded, smeared with flying ointment and placed on a broomstick. The ointment would confuse the mind, speed up the pulse and numb the feet. When they were told "You are flying over land and sea," the witch took their word for it.

Halloween Nuts
A halloween custom associated in the Western Isles is to put two large nuts in the fire. These represent yourself and your intended spouse. If the nuts jump together when they are warmed up, this is deemed to be a good omen, but if they jump apart then it is time to look for someone else!

Halloween Nut-cracking
-Place two nuts (such as conkers) on a fire. Give the nuts the names of two possible lovers and the one that cracks first will be the one.

Halloween Wet Shirts
Another old halloween custom is to wet a shirt-sleeve, hang it up to the fire to dry , and lie in bed watching it till midnight, when the apparition of the individual's future partner for life will come in and turn the sleeve.


Halloweeen Fun - Halloween Party Suppies - Halloween Spells
To see your future husband - Retire into a dark room on halloween night - with one candle as the only light. Place the candle in front of a mirror and peer into the glass. At the same time, you must either be eating an apple or combing your hair. After a few moments it is said that the face of the man whom you will wed will appear over your shoulder. Another superstition decrees that if a woman should eat a salted herring just before she goes to bed, her future husband will appear to her in a dream, carrying a cup of water with which to quench her thirst.

To discover who will be the first to marry - Halloween Night Spell - Four cups of the same size are set upon a circular table. In one of the cups there is placed a ring, in another a sixpenny-piece, and in another a sprig of orange-blossom or a piece of heather, while the last cup remains empty. Those who wish to take part in the test are blindfolded, and must walk slowly three times round the table and then touch one of the cups on it. The first person to touch the cup containing the orange-blossom or heather will be the first to wed; anyone selecting the cup with the coin will never know want; the cup with the ring represents devoted love; while the empty cup suggests a single life.

To ascertain if your lover is true.-On Halloween select one of the letters which you have received from your sweetheart, especially one which contains a particularly passionate and important declaration; lay it wide open upon a table and then fold it nine times. Pin the folds together, place the letter in your left-hand glove, and slip it under your pillow. If on that night you dream of silver, gems, glass, castles or clear water, your lover is true and his declarations are genuine; if you dream of linen, storms, fire, wood, flowers, or he is saluting you, he is false and has been deceiving you.