h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Just wanted to make a few remarks in the spirit of clarification.
Firstly, the Celtic pagans were not literate folks. Thus, they left no sacred texts behind when they were wiped out by the Christian movement. As a result, we can have only the faintest idea what their beliefs really entailed, and everything we belive about their culture today (including the modern "Pagan" movement) is no more than an interpretation. There is, however, absolutely no evidence that Samhain was a god, and furthermore, the Celts had no god of Death or the Underworld as such. The Samhain article referenced gives some excellent information on the holiday.
There was a brief mention of the Jack-o'-Lantern tradition in the Samhain article, but I thought I'd add what I know on the subject. Jack was a right bastard who knew how to have a good time, and one night he had a run-in with the devil at a pub. Insert your own amusing story about how Jack bests the Devil and forces Old Scratch to promise not to come back for him until X years have passed. When he eventually returned for Jack, the latter bested him again and made him promise never to take his soul. When Jack finally died, he'd been too bad to enter Heaven, but could not be accepted into hell because of the Devil's promise. He was condemned, therefore, to continue walking the Earth until Judgement Day. He asked at least for a light to find his way, and in response Lucifer hurled a coal from the fires of Hell at him. Jack put it into the turnip he was eating and set off. This was the beginning of the Jac-o'-the Lantern tradition. When the Irish came to America they found pumpkins more numerous and as suited for the purpose as the turnip, and we continue to carve them today.
Of course, that's clearly the Christianized version (albeit in a rather loose Irish way) of the story...if the tradition was in use earlier, the original story might be lost forever. Anyway.
The third point I wanted to talk about was trick-or-treating. It began with some canny peasants who were pissed at their landlords. Samhain being, as it was, a time when the Tuatha De Danaan (the displaced Good Folk) were particularly active, the peasants decided to take advantage of their reputation. They would move things around in their landlords' yards, place things on top of roofs, and generally vandalize and be a nuisance, all in the dead of night. The landlords were eager to appease the aggrandizing Good Folk and so left sacrifices of food and drink in hopes that they would be left alone. Thus, the spirit of the tradition was "give us something nice or we will mess with your life".
Today we have lost sight of this. People seem only to remember the "trick" part. They seem to think that if they don't wish to play in the "game", they needn't, and all the little trick-or-treaters can just go somewhere else. Bull. The landlords sure didn't want to play. If you decide to pass out popcorn balls or nasty store-bought apples or little packets of balloons or some damn thing--or, worse, you just shut off the lights and don't answer the door--you had better expect a little hell. There's only two choices, folks; make us happy or suffer the consequences. I encourage Halloween pranking on those who deserve it. Halloween is the only holiday with built-in traditions to punish those who don't catch the spirit; we ought to take advantage of it.

Here in Scotland, October sees a real change in the year as the nights suddenly become incredibly dark around 4pm, and there is a real chill in the air.

Halloween comes at a time of year when it is possible to understand just how our ancestors could believe that the world had died. The old religions practised human sacrifice in an attempt to bring back the Sun, and many of these were centred around burning and drowning.

The swirling mists that suddenly appear round about pools and rivers do have an eery feeling to them and, again, it is possible to see how people asssociated them with these sacrifices, believing that they were the souls of the dead rising back out of the ground.

As part of our Halloween tradition here we get children to dress up and go "guising". they wear scary costumes to confuse the wandering spirits and go from door to door, often to friends and family, where they are expected to perform a song or tell a story in return for favours, such as sweets or fruit.

Therefore, if an uneasy spirit shows up at your door you take them in and show them the same respect as the living.And if they don't know any stories or songs tehy might not be the neighbours kids but some ghost..... Don't know what you do then!

Some of the traditional games hark back to these human sacrifices, ducking (or dooking) for apples, involves people plunging their heads into a pool (alright, a basin) of water and trying to catch an apple. Of course, they are blindfold and have to keep their hands behind their backs....

Or trying to catch pancakes coated in treacle, suspended by threads from the roof. The pancake and treacle take the place of teh burnt offering eaten by the sacrificial victim (q.v. Lindow Man and Pete Marsh)

Then there are a whole range of divining games, casting apple peel over the shoulder to make the initial of a loved one, spying in a glass, looking for faces in the flames...

dear king's fool, sir:

You have added a whole buncha great details!

I agree about Samhain not being a god. The word is actually from the gaelic, meaning 'summer's end'.

However, remember the Roman myth about the goddes Persephone who was captured by the god of the underworld? She ate 6 pomegranete seeds while imprisoned. Because of this, when her mother, Demeter, came to rescue her, she was only able to bargain for Persephone's freedom for 6 months. So from that time forward, winter began when Persephone went to spend 6 months in the underworld each year. This has nothing to do with Samhain, except that it is a legend that DOES connect a god of the underworld with the beginning of winter.

Your Jack-o'-Lantern story is a good one! It was also posted by JimiX in the forum for the Samhain article. http://www.h2g2.com/forumframe.cgi?thread=23808&forum=24539#p116977 His story is another version of the Irish tale. The characteristic of Jack using the lantern to guide in his wanderings about the world is based on the Celtic belief that the candles would guide the souls of the departed on Samhain.

You have also added a dimension to the origins of 'trick or treating', and one which has largely been obscured [especially in the US] by the Quest For Candy. The [playful and, we hope, harmless] pranks have largely been overshadowed by the commercial sale of costumes, candy, decorations., etc., etc.

Isn't folklore wonderful????????

-blu
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