Spooky Scary Skeleton, His History is Weird

Contrary to popular belief, Halloween is in fact not pagan - but like Mardi Gras, it's based in Christianity. Who knew! It's kind of odd that a holiday often associated with the devil or evil spirits has quite pure origins; the origins to Halloween are not nearly as nefarious as they may seem based on current pop culture. Yes, Halloween did start as a pagan tradition where the belief was that the souls of loved ones who had passed were able to visit within the day. When Christianity began to spread to the regions celebrating the pagan tradition, pagans and Christians would both come together to pray for and pay their respects to those who had passed.

To be clear, the pagan Halloween was first celebrated in what is now the United Kingdom and the people there at the time were the Celts. As more and more Christian missionaries began to convert the Celts there was a push to rid the region of the pagan-centered beliefs. There was a feast adopted on November 1st and the prior day (All Hallows Eve) in connection with the Celts' interpretation of the Christian Bible. This shifted the belief of the ability of the dead to interact with the living to the ability of Jesus Christ to chase away evil, or something to that extent. Which of course, shifted the meaning of Halloween to seeing it as a day of the Christian God's triumph over evil forces. Hence the birth of Halloween as we know it: the word comes from "All Hallows Eve" and "Hallowmass" which both point to "The Holy Evening." At least, that's one theory. The other is that Halloween never started on the pagan end of things and was always observed in Christianity as "All Hallows Eve" without any outside influences.

By the end of the 12th century the holiday was widely known, as criers would dress in black and walk the streets reminding people to say a prayer for all of those who had been lost. In some places food, drink, and lit candles were left at grave sites as a tribute to those who had passed. Sounds almost familiar, right? This is probably where the thought of "we need to dress up and give out candy" tradition started. It's not too far of a leap from wearing mourning clothes and wearing costumes, especially since sometimes there were masquerade banquets held on All Hallows Eve in mainland Europe (this is said to have begun with the French, so it's safe to say that they are probably responsible for what is done now to celebrate Halloween).

There are a few things we haven't addressed - for example, where did pumpkin carving come from? It's probably based on Irish turnip lanterns which sound so much cuter than they actually were. More often than not they weirdly resembled a mummified head and were said to represent the souls of the dead originally.

Interested in knowing the origin of some of the other odd traditions of Halloween? Too bad! You'll have to wait until October of next year to learn the rest of this! Or well, you could google if you really wanted to.

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