HISTORY OF HALLOWEEN
Halloween
is a celebration of British culture that is celebrated on the night of October
31.
Its origins date back to the
Celts more than 2,500 years ago, when the Celtic year ended at the end of
summer, on 31 October of our calendar (Samhain).
Cattle were brought from the
fields to the stables for the winter. That last day, it was assumed that the
spirits could leave the cemetery and take over the bodies of the living to
raise, ask food and cursing.
They were victims of spells if they refused their
requests: you give me something or I get into mischief, which is the
translation of "Trick or Treat" (Trick or Treat).
To avoid this, the Celtic
villages and houses littered the "decorated" with bones, skulls and
other nasty things, so spend long dead scared. Hence the tradition of
decorating houses with sinister motives in the current Halloween costumes and
saints. It is therefore a party associated with the coming of the pagan gods to
life.
The church of Rome decided to
convert to Catholicism festival. Was instituted on November 1 as All Saints
Day, which in England was called "All Hallows 'Day", and the night
before "All Hallows' Eve" which subsequently resulted in
"Halloween".
The party was exported to the
United States by European immigrants in the nineteenth century, around 1846.
But no mass was first celebrated in 1921. That year was the first Halloween
parade in Minnesota and then was followed by other states. The
internationalization of Halloween came in the late '70s and early '80s thanks
to movies and television series.
Today children dress for the
occasion and walk the streets begging for candy door to door. After knocking
children utter the phrase "Trick or Treat". If adults give them
candy, money or any other reward, is interpreted to have accepted the deal. If
instead they refuse, the boys spend a little joke.
Halloween is a holiday based on
fear, death, the undead, black magic and mystical monsters. The
"characters" that are often associated with Halloween include ghosts,
witches, black cats, goblins, banshees, zombies and demons, as well as some
literary figures like Dracula and Frankenstein's monster.
The Celts used to dress up in
animal skins on October 31 and thus avoid detection by spirits who, according
to them, that night regained life. Hence the current practice of dressing up
that day. The traditional colors of Halloween are the black of night and the
orange of the first light of day. Halloween symbols also include elements
autumn like pumpkins and scarecrows.
