Oregon daily emerald., October 27, 2000, Page 8B, Image 16

The history and heritage of ‘All Hallows Eve’
■ Halloween is an ancient
holiday that has been
celebrated different ways in
different cultures
By Rosemary Ellen Guiley
Halloween Magazine
Originally a pagan festival of the
dead, Halloween has survived to
the present in popular culture as a
night of trick-or-treating by chil
dren and others dressed in cos
tumes of fantasy and the supernat
ural. All Hallows Eve is observed
the night of October 31, followed
on November 1 by All Hallows
Day, also called All Hallowmas,
All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day.
The ancient Celts called the fes
tival Samhain and observed it to
celebrate the onset of winter and
the beginning of the Celtic New
Year; "Samhain" means "end of
summer." In Ireland the festival
was known as Samhein, or La Sa
mon, the Feast of the Sun. In Scot
land, the celebration was known
as Hallowe’en. Samhain was a so
lar festival marked by sacred fire
and fire rituals. During the height
of the Druids, the priestly caste of
the Celts, all fires except those of
the Druids were
Samhain.
levied a fee for the holy
which burned at their al
tars.
In ancient Ireland,
the Druids sacri
ficed to the
deities by burn
ing victims in
wickerwork
cages. All
other fires
were to be
extin
guished
and were
relit from
the sacrifi
cial fire.
Samhein
marked the
third and fi
nal harvest,
and the storage
of provisions for
the winter. The
veil between the
worlds of the living
and the dead was be
lieved to be at its thinnest
point in the year, making
communication between the liv
ing and the dead much easier. On
the eve of the holiday, the souls of
the dead freely roamed the land of
the living.
The Romans observed
the holiday of Feralia, in
tended to give rest and
peace to the depart
ed. Participants
made sacrifices in
honor of the
dead, offered up
prayers for
them, and
made obla
tions to them.
The festival
was celebrat
ed on Febru
ary 21, the
end of the Ro
man year. In
the 7th centu
ry, Pope Boni
face IV intro
duced All Saints'
Day to replace the
pagan festival of the
dead. It was observed
on May 13. Later, Gre
gory III changed the date
to November 1. The Greek
Orthodox Church observes it
on the first Sunday after Pentecost.
Numerous folk customs con
nected with the pagan observances
for the dead have survived to the
present. In addition to the souls of
the dead roaming about, the Devil,
witches and numerous spirits are
believed to be out and at the peak
of their supernatural powers. In
Ireland and Scotland, the custom
of extinguishing one's home fire
and relighting if from the festival
bonfire has continued into modem
times.
Samhain, as it is still called in
some parts, is a time for getting rid
of weakness, as pagans once
slaughtered weak animals which
were unlikely to survive the win
ter. A common ritual calls for writ
ing down weaknesses on a piece of
paper or parchment and tossing it
into the fire. Cakes are baked as of
ferings for the souls of the dead.
In some parts of modem Scot
land, young people still celebrate
by building bonfires on hilltops
and high ground and then dance
around the flames. The fire is
known as Hallowe'en bleeze, and
custom once included digging a
circular trench around the fire to
symbolize the sun.
The custom of trick or treating
probably has several origins. An
old Irish peasant practice called
for going door to door to collect
money, breadcake, cheese, eggs,
butter, nuts or apples in prepara
tion for the festival of St. Columb
Kill. Another was the begging for
soul cakes, or offerings for one's
self - particularly in exchange for
promises of prosperity or protec
tion against bad luck.
Blair Witch
up to old
tricks
BURKITTSVILLE, Md. — The
Blair Witch is haunting
Burkittsville again.
The tiny western Maryland
town is bracing for a second on
slaught of “Blair Witch” fanatics
with today’s release of a sequel to
last year’s surprising box-office
hit.
The town’s road signs — stolen
last year — have been replaced.
The number of witch-seekers
stalking through the cemetery has
slowed to a trickle.
And you won’t see any stick fig
urines, the trademark of the Blair
Witch craze, among the cardboard
Halloween ghosts and fake cob
webs hanging on houses here.
Still, Burkittsville’s 200 resi
dents expect more than just local
trick-or-treaters after the opening
of the new movie, “Book of Shad
ows: Blair Witch 2.”
“There’s concern that the sec
ond one will bring in a larger
number of people than last time,”
said Phil Stanley, 63, who moved
to the town two years ago because
of its obscurity.
Frederick County police, who
do not patrol Burkittsville heavily,
will post several officers in town
from Friday through Halloween
night.
Burkittsville’s tranquility was
shattered in the summer of 1999
when the low-budget “The Blair
Witch Project” became a sensa
tion. The mock documentary pur
ported to show three film students
who disappear in the hills outside
town while searching for a mythi
cal witch.
The Associated Press