A Tale of Spirits

By Robin DuMolin

Halloween is the eve of All Saints Day, a very solemn festival of the church, yet one steeped in a history of magic, and superstition, a night for spirits. The American celebration has its origins taken from Scottish and Irish folk customs. Druids held the earliest Halloween celebrations in honor of Samhain, Lord of the Dead whose festival fell on Nov. 1st. This day was also Celtic New Years Day. It was called the time when “the light that loses, the night that wins.” The Druids believed that Samhain, assembled the souls of all those who had died during the previous year.
For their sins, these souls had been confined to lower animals, on Nov. 1st, their sins being atoned for, they were released into Druid Heaven. Horses and humans were sacrificed. The humans were mainly criminals. They were put in wicker cages in the shape of animals and roasted alive by the Druid priests.
Later on in history, black cats were sacrificed during medieval times because these cats were believed to be the familiars of witches or witches themselves. Even after the Christians had taken over pagan temples, oxen continued to be sacrificed on this date in the churches. Bedes ecclesiastical history of the English people quotes a letter from Pope Gregory the Great, in the 6th Century, to convey his message to the Archbishop of Canterbury, that “the temples of the idols in that nation ought not to be destroyed but the idols should. That the sacrifice of oxen in pagan worship should be allowed to continue. But this should be done in honor of the saints.” In 1834, Pope Gregory the 4th established this festival to be observed by all churches.
Outside the church, the belief in Halloween as a gathering time for spirits continued with little change. To the ghosts originally assembled by the Lord of the Dead were added troops of goblins and fairies. The fairy as it first appears in Scottish and Irish legend was a being larger and more beautiful than men. They were the ghosts of ancient kings and heroes mingled with elder gods. Their burial mounds of the Neolithic and Bronze Age people were their dwellings and they rode forth on the feast of Samhain to take a scornful look at the weak people who kept the land they once ruled. Stunned by the sound of the church bells and shrunk by holy water, the fairies dwindled to little people.
Long after the Church had prevailed over paganism, country people everywhere in Europe continued their old practice of catering to spirits and strengthening fertility by magical rites. In the later middle ages, the Church began to take a more pronounced stand against pagan tradition, and with the Reformation, these traditions were considered heresy. The result was witchcraft became an organized cult in opposition to the Church. Halloween became the great witch night. The prince of darkness and his followers, witches and warlocks, gathered to mock, the church’s festival of All Saints Day. On the eve of Samhain, the pagan Celts lit bonfires on the hills to welcome the winter season and ward off evil spirits. In homes, all cooking fires were extinguished and new ones lit in token of the New Year. The idea that spirits fear fire was widespread and with the spread of witchcraft, fire became the favorite weapon against the powers of darkness. The burning of witches then was a rite of purification, not just punishment.
In medieval times, criers dressed all in black, marched all through the streets, on All Soul’s Day ringing a mournful sounding bell and asking all good people to remember the poor souls in purgatory and to say prayers for them. These “soulers” walked throughout England on this day singing and begging. They collected alms with the agreement that these soulers would say extra prayers for the dead relatives of the donors. In Yorkshire, the bakers made special saumas (soul mass) loaves giving them to their customers. One loaf was kept in each household all year for good luck and as a charm against death.
In both pagan and Christian times, the time between nightfall on October 31st to sunset on the 2nd of November held special significance. It’s a time when the invisible world of spirit is closer to our visible physical world. On this night, the soul’s of the dead return. Elves, trolls, and witches are also about. Since these spirits can see into the future divination games have always been popular on Halloween. In Scotland and Ireland especially, these games were popular and it’s mainly from these countries that the Halloween custom of the United States have been taken. Although these games were done in fun, there was enough superstition left to give people an eerie feeling that maybe the spirits were directing the omens of the nuts and apples and other charms and that their prophecies may come true.
Witches sabbaths were large meeting held at night. The main ones were on May Eve and Halloween. There was feasting and revelry at these sabbaths. Witches, warlocks and devils danced in a ring. Many witches claimed to have arrived at these meetings by broom. A special ointment had to be applied to the broom and the witch. Some of the ingredients were poppy, foxglove, belladonna, deadly nightshade and mandrake. These are all powerful hallucinatory drugs. Wines made from mandrake alone produced deep sleep and lurid dreams. It isn’t strange that witches said they flew on their broomsticks.
Halloween did not find a place in the American consciousness until the Gaelic people immigrated to America. These colonists began the custom of holding gatherings at farmhouses on October 31st. Apples and nuts being plentiful during this time were an important ingredient at these gatherings. Halloween was often called “Snap Apple Night,” or “Nutcrack Night,” in pioneer days. Participants played traditional divination games with nuts on the hearth, dunking for apples, girls threw apple peelings over their shoulders to determine their future bridegrooms initials. They also discovered that American pumpkins were wonderful for making jack-o-lanterns. Early Irish Americans since they believed in fairies believed that any mischief was due to them. This is the background for the vandalism and practical jokes that occurred on this night.
One origin of how trick or treat started stems from a time in Ireland when country people on the eve of Samhain paraded around stopping at each farmhouse begging for contributions in the name of “Muck Olla”. The name is probably a derivative of an old Druid god. A man wearing a white robe and a horse mask led the group. (The horse was sacred to the Sun God). At each household they recited verses relating to the farmer’s prosperity, due to “Muck Olla. His goodness and prosperity would only continue if he made a large contribution to Muck Olla.
Halloween masquerading may have got its origin from the medieval custom, of celebrating Allhallows. This day was dedicated to the saints. Each church would display their relics, but there weren’t enough to go around. Newer and poorer churches that didn’t have relics masqueraded as their patron saints; others dressed as angels or devils. The All hallows procession ended up at the churchyard and it eventually became a festive and varied parade.

Sources: Halloween through 20 Centuries by Ralph and Adeline Linton