Today I am going to educate you about how the history of Halloween is important, how it evolved and how I personally celebrate Halloween(parallelism). Several ages ago(hyperbole), Halloween was a very religious ceremony, but now it is just a party with candy and costumes for most people, have you ever wondered what the point of Halloween even is? The only thing that is the same is the fact that Halloween marks the end of harvesting season.
So let's talk about how Halloween was celebrated over 2,000 years ago. According to History.com, Halloween received its roots from the Celtic festival of Samhain, which was celebrated on October 31st. Celts held this festival because they believed that on Samhain, spirits returned to earth. On this night, the Celts would prepare bonfires and offer sacrifices in honor the spirits returning to earth. However, during the festival, good versus evil came in to play(antithesis). Some villagers hid in costumes made out of animal skins to drive away from the evil spirits. Villagers were very serious about keeping their festival pure, so they also placed dinner tables with food to settle the evil spirits.
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Halloween has evolved greatly since medieval times. Stated by History.com, In the middle ages people started to take a different turn when celebrating halloween. Instead of driving away unwanted spirits like the Celts, people began dressing up as demons, ghosts, and other pretend creatures. These people would perform various shenanigans in return for sugar or snack(alliteration). This act is called mumming. Now, a little later in the middle ages, around the ninth century, Chritsianity started to occur within the Celts. Chritianity gradually replaced the older Pagan practices. In 1,000 A.D, the church dedicated November 2nd to All Souls Day, which was also a new way of honoring the dead for the Celts.
History.com says that in England, celebrations resembled Celtic praising of lost souls. They celebrated with bonfires, like the Celts, but they also held masquerades. England Also had their own way of celebrating too. Poor individuals would go “souling” or visit wealthy peoples’ houses and receive “soul cakes”, also known as pastries, in exchange for promising to pray for the lost souls of the wealthy peoples’ family. Later on this practice was attempted by children, who would travel house to house asking for gifts such as food, coins, or british beer. Over in Scotland and Ireland, things were similar to England, but Instead of calling their practice “souling” these people called it “guising”. Guising is defined as individuals dressing up in special costumes and accepting things from various households. Instead of promising to pray for the dead in return for treats, the Scottish and Irish would sing, recite a poem, or carry out some sort of joke or trick for their treat. Unlike England, thie treats consisted of fruit, nuts and money.
According to country living.com, The United States quickly replaced the English, Irish and Scotish traditions. Pranks became more popular amongst young people in America. Soon after that, the Great Depression hit hard and pranks on Halloween went from silly jokes to vandalism, violence and physical harm to others. After the 1930s, World War two occurred and the trend of jokes for candy pretty much vanished due to the low supply of sugar and other goods. Thankfully, the post war brought back the American Halloween tradition that we all know today. Since candy companies were no longer held back by sugar rationing, they launched advertisements around Halloween season to spread the tradition worldwide.
Now that we have a little bit of knowledge about Hallowwen, we can now talk about how I celebrate this wonderful holiday. It all starts with my dad cooking my family his famous chili. I always love having the warm chili before I go outside to trick or treat with my friends. Yes, I still trick or treat. I am a little kid by heart. After I get done hauling all my candy around, I come back to my house to prepare to hand out candy to little kids. My favorite part about handing out candy is hiding in the bushes near the walkway to my front door to scare the kids who walk by. I once made a kid pee his pants, this kid was as scared as a deer in the headlights(simile). Once it gets too late to hand out candy I go inside and pick out a good horror movie to watch with my dad. That pretty much sums up my Halloween night.
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