By Laurie Siblock
Halloween has become a much-loved
holiday when adults and children alike dress in costume and attempt to scare
the daylights out of each other. This frighteningly fun holiday has been around
for over 2000 years but its origins were much more serious than the
lighthearted celebrations we have today. The history of Halloween begins with
the Celts of Northern Europe, a hunting and herding people, who celebrated the
harvest as well as the onset of winter when they brought the herds in to
shelter. Only the hardiest of the herd were kept and fed over the winter.
The others were slaughtered making it a time of great feasting and celebration
of the harvest. This communal feast was dedicated to Samhain (pronounced
“SOW-in, the word means “end of summer”). Samhain was also the Celtic Lord of
the Dead and it was believed that October 31st was the one night when
the veil between the living and the dead was most permeable. In an act of
self-preservation, people disguised themselves as ghosts and spirits in order
to blend in with the real ones and they led parades out of town in the hopes of
leading evil spirits away.
In 2009, Lang Pioneer Village
Museum, re-invented our Spooky Halloween event to shed light on the historic
origins of Halloween. At All Hallows’ Eve between 6 pm and 9 pm on October 28
and 29, the Village is the perfect setting for delving into earlier traditions
that have morphed into our modern Halloween customs. Visitors to All Hallows’
Eve will encounter many spirits. They may not be visible (although some people
can see them) but they will be here in the shadows, in the whistling winds and
gloom of the night. Bring the whole family to experience a fun night of
wandering spirits, divination, “soul-cakes”, bone-fires, the magic of the
fairies, eerie tales that will astonish you and jack-o-lanterns. Do come
well-disguised for, as the Celts believed, the veil between this world and the
next will be very thin. You’ll want to blend in.
