A History of Halloween
By: Evelyn Hoff
Once we stop and think about it, Halloween is pretty messed up. After all, why do we walk around in monster costumes asking for candy every October 31? Where did this strange and spooky holiday come from?
Halloween dates back to ancient times, when the Celtics celebrated the festival of Samhain. (pronounced sow-in.) They celebrated their new year on November 1. This day was the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter, a time that was associated with death. Celts believed that on October 31 (New Year’s Eve), the ghosts of the dead came back to earth. They celebrated by dressing in costumes and having a huge bonfire. But by 43 A.D., the Romans had conquered the Celtic territory. During the four hundred years that they ruled Celtic lands, two of their festivals were combined with Samhain. The first one was called Feralia, a day in late October, where they recognized their dead. The second one was called Pomona, who was the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. Her symbol is the apple, and it is believed that the tradition of bobbing for apples originated from it being incorporated into Samhain.
In 609 A.D., Pope Boniface IV created the feast of All Martyrs Day. Later on, Pope Gregory III (731-741) incorporated saints as well as martyrs into the feast day, and moved the day from May 13 to November 1. By the 9th century, Christianity had spread to Celtic lands and it blended with its old traditions, including its late October festivals.
In 1000 A.D., November 2 was made All Souls Day. All Saints was called All-Hallows. The night before that was called Hallows-Eve, which eventually became Halloween.
When America was first being colonized, Halloween celebrations were limited in New England. It was, however, common in the southern colonies. However, as European traditions combined with those of American Indians, the American Halloween was born. It started with neighborhood parties that celebrated the end of the harvest, where people would gather and share stories of the dead. By the middle of the nineteenth century, these autumn festivals were common, but Halloween still wasn’t celebrated everywhere in the country.
During the second half of the nineteenth century, many immigrants came to America. These immigrants helped popularize Halloween. Trick-or-treat was born when people began to dress in costumes and go door-to-door asking for food or money. It was a night of ghost stories and mischief. However, in the late 1800s, people started to want Halloween to be more about community than witchcraft. Because of this, Halloween lost most of its superstitions by the beginning of the twentieth century.
By the 20s and 30s, Halloween had become a community-based holiday. By the 50s, it became a holiday geared mostly towards young children. When the superstition arose that people could avoid tricks by giving out treats, the tradition of giving out candy was born.
Today, Halloween is the second largest commercial holiday in the United States, and is certainly one of the most popular, fun, and superstitious.
