Samhain

Halloween's origins date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced sow-in). It is the time between Samhain (pronounced "SOW-in" in Ireland, SOW-een in Wales, "SAV-en" in Scotland or even "SAM-haine" in non Gaelic speaking countries) and Brigid's Day "the period of little sun." Thus, Samhain is often named the "Last Harvest" or "Summer's End". The Earth nods a sad farewell to the God.

Celtic folklore

The Samhain celebration survived in several guises as a festival dedicated to the dead. In Ireland and Scotland, the Feile na Marbh, the "festival of the dead" took place on Samhain.

Samhain Eve, in Irish and Scots Gaelic, Oidhche Shamhna, is one of the principal festivals of the Celtic calendar, and is thought to fall on or around the 31st of October. It represents the final harvest.

In modern Ireland and Scotland, the name by which Halloween is known in the Gaelic language is still "Oíche/Oidhche Shamhna".

Bonfires played a large part in the festivities. Even into Christian times, villagers cast the bones of the slaughtered cattle upon the flames, cattle having a prominent place in the pre-Christian Gaelic world. The English word 'bonfire' derives from these "bone fires," but the Gaelic has no such parallel.

With the bonfire ablaze, the villagers extinguished all other fires. Each family then solemnly lit its hearth from the common flame, thus bonding the families of the village together.

According to Irish mythology, during that night the great shield of Scathach was lowered, allowing the barriers between the worlds to fade and the forces of chaos to invade the realms of order, the material world conjoining with the world of the dead.

At this time the spirits of the dead and those yet to be born walked amongst the living. The dead could return to the places where they had lived and food and entertainment were provided in their honour. In the three days preceding Samhain, the Sun God Lugh, maimed at Lughnassadh (August 1), dies by the hand of his Tanaiste (counterpart or heir), the Lord of Misrule.

Lugh traverses the boundaries of the worlds on the first day of Samhain. His Tanist is a miser and, though shining brightly in the winter skies, he gives no warmth and does not temper the breath of the Crone, Cailleach Bheare, the north wind.In parts of western Brittany Samhain is still heralded by the baking of kornigou, cakes baked in the shape of antlers to commemorate the god of winter shedding his "cuckold" horns as he returns to his kingdom in the Otherworld.

The Romans identified Samhain with their own feast of the dead, the Lemuria. This, however, was observed in the days leading up to May 13.With Christianization, the festival in November (not the Roman festival in May) became All Hallows' Day on November 1st followed by All Souls' Day, on November 2nd, after which the night of October 31 was called All Hallow's Eve, and the remnants festival dedicated to the dead eventually morphed into the secular holiday known as Halloween.

Neo-Paganism

Samhain is one of the eight solar holidays or sabbats of Neopaganism. It is celebrated in the northern hemisphere on October 31 or November 1 and in the southern hemisphere on May 1. The holiday, with Beltane, is one of the most popular among Neopagans, and public Samhain rituals invariably attract large gatherings. It is the last of the harvest festivals (after Lammas and Mabon); in some traditions it symbolizes the death of the old god. Among the sabbats, it is preceded by Mabon and followed by Yule. From an astrological perspective, the setting of the Pleiades, the winter stars, heralds the supremacy of night over day and the start of the dark half of the year that is ruled by the realms of the moon.

Samhain

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