TWINAGERS NEWS 
                                                                                                                                                                           02/11/07
                                                                                                      Halloween Origins

         Halloween celebration has pagan origins and has its roots in the old Celtic who lived in Great Britain. In fact the old Celtics that lived in Great Britain, Ireland and France, they had party on the beginning of the new year the 1st November: on that day they celebrated the end of the "hot season" and the beginning of the "cold and shadows’ season".
         The night between 31st October and 1st November was the most solemn moment of all the druidical year and it represented for the Celtic people the most important celebration of their calendar and it was called the Samhain's night. All the most importants legends where they talk about epical cycles, old stories, big battles and they talk about kings and heroes, happened during the Samhain's night. A lot of these legends talked about fertility of the Earth and the overcaming of the dark winter season. For this reason they waited for the darkest half of the year with great fear and they celebrated with a cosmic respect, terror and panic the beginning of the semestral kingdom of shadow's God: Samhain.
         The Celtic people believed that on the eve of every year (31st October) Samhain, Lord of Death, Prince of the Shadows, called to him all the spirits of the dead people and they were afraid that in that day all the laws of space and time were suspended, allowing to the world of spirits to reunion to the world of alive people. The Celtic people in fact believed that dead people lived in a land of eternity youngness and happiness called Tir nan Oge and they believed that sometimes died people could stay with Fairy on the little hills that surround the Scottish and Irish territory.
         A legend says that all people died the year before returned on the Earth on the night of 31st October, looking for new bodies to own for the next year. So in the villages every fireplace was switched off to prevent bad spirits to arrive and stay there. That rite consisted in switching off the Sacred Fire on the altar and switching on the New Fire (that symbolized the arriving of the new year) the next morning. Druids met on the top of a hill in a dark forest of oaks (tree considered sacred) to switch the New Fire on and offer sacrifices of sements and animals. Dancing and singing around the fireplace until the morning, they sanctioned the passage from the sun season and the season of shadows. When the day came, Druids carried the cinders still burning of fire to each family that provided for switch the domestic fireplace on. Switching off the fire maent that the dark half of year (so death) was arriving but turn it on maent hope and return to life, so giving the ciclic representation of the time to this rite. So at sunset they switched the fire on once again with those who burnt offers, they touched the wood and they made spells to move the souls of the dead people away from the village and drive them to the dead’s earth.
In fact the old Celtic people were afraid especially of the moment of sunset because they believed that spirits could wander among the Earth. With their help, Samhain (the terrible god of the night) could put in prison and kill the Sun, and without him life would have end.
So it was necessary to offer sacrifices to placate the errant spirits and to respect the god.
An old medieval legend says that in Ireland, when San Patrizio was alive, in a place called Mag Sleht every first-born was sacrified during the night of Samhain to Cromm Cruac, a bad god.
         The modern custom of disguise oneself on the day of Halloween, born from the tradition that the Celtic People HAD, after the sacrifices on the night of 31st October, to have party for 3 days by putting on a mask made by sinks of died animals killed to exorcize and scare the spirits.
Dressed with those grotesque masks they returned to the village lighting their street with lanterns made with onions with inside the embers of Sacred Fire.
         An origin of the saying "Trick or Treat" comes from the time when the first Christians, walking from a village to another one asked for a piece of "sweet of soul", that was a piece of bread. More "Sweet of Soul" a person received, more prayers promised to say for the dead people of the family from they received the bread.
         Infact in that time people believed that dead people could go to the Paradise thanks to the parents' prayers and even from strangers' prayers.
Just from these legends has origin the famous saying “TRICK or TREAT” in which the children dressed with monstrous and terrifying masks and customs go to all the houses, asking sweets or some money. If they do not receive anythin, they can play an ugly joke to the owners of that house, like emptying the dustbin in the garden or attacking empty cans to the tube of the escape of the car.
         When during the first century the Romans invaded the Great Britain, they met these celebrations. Around the 1st November they honored Pomona, the goddess of the fruits and the garden too. During this festivity fruits (apples) were offered to the divinity to favour the future fertility. With the passing of the centuries the cult of Samhain and Pomona were melted in one, and the custom of the sacrifices was abandoned, leaving to its place the offer of effigies to burn and the custom to mask like ghosts and witches became part of the ceremonial.

                                                                                      Tomasz B., Marcin R., Szymon M., Bartosz W., Bartek D., Grzegorz R., Zespol Szkol Lacznosci   
                                                                                                                             con la partecipazione dei licei Alessi e Lurçat   

                                                                   Halloween dictionary

                                                                               Tomasz B., Marcin R., Szymon M., Bartosz W., Bartek D., Grzegorz R., Zespol Szkol Lacznosci   
                                                                             Claudia V., Alessio B, liceo Alessi  
                                             Liceo Lurçat