A Popular History of Unpopular Things
A podcast that makes history more fun and accessible - we love all things gory, gross, mysterious, and weird!
A Popular History of Unpopular Things
The History of Halloween
Join Kelli as she explores the Celtic roots of Halloween - from Samhain and Celtic mythology, to Puritan fun-sponges, to Irish immigration, and into Spirit Halloween stores, we'll learn the history behind the second biggest holiday in the US!
Support me on my Patreon - your support helps keep this podcast going! You'll get exclusive benefits for being a historian, explorer, or cannibal on the APHOUT Patreon! Click the link below to join today!
A Popular History of Unpopular Things Patreon
Intro and Outro music credit: Nedric
Find him on all streaming services and YouTube, and check out his debut EP, Yello Kake!
Want to start your own podcast?
Click this link to get set up with Buzzsprout and you'll get a $20 credit to sign up!
The History of Halloween
Intro
Welcome to A Popular History of Unpopular Things, a mostly scripted podcast that makes history more fun and accessible. My kind of history is the unpopular stuff - disease, death, and destruction. I like learning about all things bloody, gross, mysterious, and weird.
Before we begin, just a reminder to support me on Patreon - putting out episodes takes a lot of time, and your support will help ensure that the podcast keeps going strong! I appreciate any help you can give, and thank you so much for being a fan.
Happy Halloween, APHOUT fans! This is the best time of the year - the weather is getting cooler, the nights are getting longer… at least for the northern hemisphere, anyway. But Halloween is a match made in heaven for all the things we love here on the APHOUT podcast - spooky, scary stories with lots of ghouls and ghosts.
So I figured, why not explore the history of Halloween? Where did it come from? What are it’s roots? How and why did it change over time?
Now, at least for the US, Halloween is associated with setting up your spaces with elaborate decorations, giving out candy to the kids, watching scary or spooky movies, and maybe tucking up under a blanket and hoping Michael Myers doesn’t come busting through your door.
Now of course, Halloween isn’t celebrated the same everywhere. In Mexico, though some kids will go trick-or-treating, the holiday is tied up with Dia de los Muertos, which takes place on November 1st and 2nd.
Italians will celebrate All Saint’s Day, a Catholic holiday that honors the dead.
But in Ireland, Halloween is taken to another level. And with good reason - what we recognize as Halloween began in Ireland, and it was an ancient festival known as Samhain [SAH-win]. And by the way - Samhain [SAH-win] is spelled S-A-M-H-A-I-N. It looks like it’s pronounced “Samhain,” but it’s not. It’s SAH-win. Gaelic is weird.
So today, I want to learn all about Samhain [SAH-win], a Celtic pagan holiday that began more than 2,000 years ago. We’ll learn all about it, and then trace how it changed over time to become the diabetic nightmare it is today.
Let’s get started!
Historical Context
So I’m primarily focusing this episode on the ancient Celts who lived in Ireland, Britain, and Scotland. To understand the roots of Samhain [SAH-win], we need to talk about Celtic mythology. It’s fascinating stuff.
There are eight days that are really important in Celtic mythology. You’ve got two equinoxes and two solstices, which should be familiar to you if you study other European mythologies. The summer solstice is called Litha [lee-tha] and it means longest day. Which makes sense, because it’s the midsummer festival. You’d light a fire in your home to keep faeries away, and not the good kind of faeries like Tinkerbell, but ones that try to trick you. If you’re a Shakespeare fan, it’s the kind of faeries you read about in Midsummer Night’s Dream.
The other solstice is Yule, the winter solstice. It’s where we get the Yule Log from, right? It’s the opposite of Litha, so it’s the shortest day of the year - the longest, darkest night.
Then there are the two equinoxes - the spring equinox, or Eostre [OHS-truh] and the autumn equinox, called Mabon [MAY-bon] - there is an even amount of light and dark on these days, the midpoints between the Litha summer solstice and Yule winter solstice.
For those of you paying attention, the solstices and equinoxes have to do with both lightness and darkness, right? Ancient Celts organized their festivals around light and dark.
But at the midpoint of the equinoxes and solstices are four fire festivals. I’ll go through them starting with the beginning of our calendar yea, and they all take place on the first of their respective months so it’s nice and easy to remember.
So starting with February 1st is Imbolc, spelled I-M-B-O-L-C, which marks the beginning of Spring. It’s a fertility festival that heralds the coming of new life - there are cute springtime baby animals, the flowers are coming back to life, all that good stuff. It’s halfway between the Yule winter solstice and the Eostre [OHS-truh] spring equinox.
After the spring equinox, we get the first day of the season of light, where there is more lightness than darkness. It’s called Beltane [BELL-tinnuh], though we usually just pronounce it phonetically nowadays, which would be Beltane. B-E-L-T-A-N-E-. It’s more commonly known as May Day, celebrated on May 1. Beltane means bright, which makes sense since it’s the first day of light season.
Then comes the summer solstice, Litha.
Between the summer solstice and the autumn equinox is Lughnasadh [LOO-nah-sah], the beginning of harvest season and the autumn, celebrated on August 1st. The pronunciation is much simpler than the spelling, but I’m going to spell it anyway for consistency’s sake. I hope I don’t lose you here. It’s L-U-G-H-N-A-S-A-D-H. Phonetically in English, it looks like Lug-nah-sadh, but LUG-ily for us, it’s just pronounced LOO-nah-sah. Phew! Here’s a fun fact about Lughnasadh [LOO-nah-sah] - there are often handfasting ceremonies, where couples will intertwine their hands together with a woven belt known as a crios, quite literally tying the knot, which is where the phrase comes from. My husband and I did this at our wedding, and it was a lovely nod to our English roots. Even though I don’t think we have much Celtic in us, but that’s okay :)
The final fire festival of the year, which takes place between the autumn equinox and the yule winter solstice is the topic of today’s episode, Samhain [SAH-win]. November 1st.
So let’s talk about Samhain [SAH-win].
Samhain
Of the four fire festivals - again that’s imbolc, beltane, lughnasadh, and samhain - samhain was considered the most important, because it’s harvest time. Communities would gather to finish the harvest, leaving their hearthfires at home to burn out. When the harvest was done, they’d join the local druid to light one big fire as a community.
Now fire, as you could imagine for early societies was very important. Many ancient cultures revere fire. In Egypt, Ra, the sun god, was also a god of fire. In Greek mythology, you might recognize the name Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods to give it to man. And Hephaestus was the Greek god of fire and blacksmithing. His Roman counterpart was Vulcan. There was even a Greek goddess of the hearth - Hestia; the Roman version was Vesta. The Yoruba have Ogun, fire god and patron of all things metallurgy. In Japan, one of Shinto’s major deities is Amaterasu, goddess of the sun. The Aztecs, the Mayans, even the Quechua of the Andes - they all have sun gods. And the list goes on and on. My point is that pre-modern cultures all revered the power of the sun and of fire.
For the Celts, it was more than just this one festival - each of these four days were associated with fire, and really, Beltane, aka May Day, was the real fiery one. Fire was really important for each of the festivals because the Celts thought it had protective powers. Walking around a fire, or jumping over it, was thought to bring fortune, protection, happiness, and fertility - for both the people and their livestock. So it’s no wonder that on Samhain [SAH-win], when the fires were left to die so the community could finish the harvest, they would gather together for a big community one. Eventually, each villager would bring some of this big fire back to their homes to relight their cold hearths.
But the holiday goes beyond just honoring the harvest and relighting your hearth - I mean, we know that some of our modern Halloween traditions root back to Samhain [SAH-win], and so far it doesn’t sound like there’s any connection.
Patience!
Now remember that Samhain [SAH-win] is was between the autumn equinox and the Yule winter solstice. It was the beginning of the dark half of the year, when there is more night than day. As such, the Celts believed that this crucial day, the beginning of the darkness, is when the thin veil separating our world from what they called the Otherworld was at it thinnest - and on Samhain, all kinds of evil creatures could cross over from the Otherworld into ours. And on the top of that list of evil creatures was the fairies, called the sidh [SHE], which is spelled S-I-D-H by the way. Sometimes the Celts would carve out turnips and put embers from the fire in them to ward off spirits. Does that sound familiar? Carving a vegetable and shoving a light in there? Ireland didn’t have pumpkins, but they sure did have turnips. And since we’re talking about food, they would also give out food and sweet treats to the community.
So let’s talk about the Otherworld. Also, I love how mythological this episode is. It’s a nice change of pace from my usual slate of cannibalism, explosions, and otherwise bloody things. Still creepy and spooky, but just less… gore.
Anyways, the Otherworld.
It wasn’t just home to evil fairies. The Otherworld was a home to all supernatural figures, including their deities, and sometimes humans strayed in there accidentally. It’s also possible that the dead passed on into the Otherworld, but it’s important to note that it’s not really heaven or hell - the Celts didn’t really have those concepts. Instead, they believed in reincarnation, and it was possible that their dead would show up in the Otherworld when they passed. Some stories describe the Otherworld as a paradise where people would enjoy eternal youth, good health, in joy, and never wanted or needed for anything. Sounds nice.
Now I’m simplifying things a bit here, but there are two main realms in the Otherworld - the Sidhe [SHEE], spelled S-I-D-H-E, and the Hy-Breasil, which was an island out in the Atlantic that doens’t actually exist. But I’m concerned with the Sidhe [SHEE], because that was where the gods and faeries lived. It was also called the long barrows or hollow hills.
If a human found him or herself falling into the Otherworld, it was usually on one of the four fire festival days - imbolc, beltane, lughnasadh, and samhain - when the lines that separated these worlds blurred. But both Beltane and Samhain [SAH-win] were when that line was thinnest.
During Samhain, it was commonly thought that both fairies and the souls of their dead, living in the Otherworld, could cross into ours. Some sources suggest that some Celts would dress up like fairies or ghouls to confuse the ones that crossed into our world, saving them from being attacked or forcible dragged into the Otherworld. Other sources dispute that, though, because the Celts didn’t leave written records - what we know comes from oral tradition and what Catholic missionaries wrote down when they came a-convertin’.
And that is where our story goes next, because at some point in the 8th century, that’s the 700s, the relatively recent Christian holiday of All Saint’s Day was moved to November 1st - which coincides nicely with Samhain [SAH-win].
All Saint’s Day
All Saint’s Day became a thing on May 13, 609 CE. Pope Boniface IV dedicated the Pantheon of Rome as a church to honor the Virgin Mary. Later in the mid-700s, Pope Gregory III changed the date to November 1st when he dedicated a chapel in St. Peter’s Basilica in honor of all Saints - the now recognized All Saints Day.
Now way before all that, Christianity had spread to the British Isles and was amongst the Celts. By the early fifth century, thats the 400s, Christianity had crossed over into Ireland. It wasn’t super successful at first, mind you, but it was there. But slowly, over time, as monotheistic religions tend to do, the people converted. One of the keys to that was the way that early Christian missionaries adapted to local celebrations, rather than completely replace them.
Another example of this - when the Christians went over to convert the recently conquered Aztecs in the 16th century, that’s the 1500s, they combined local Aztec beliefs with All Saint’s Day, creating Dia de los Muertos - the Day of the Dead. It’s called cultural syncretism; combining two different cultural elements together into one new things. Voodoo is like this too - it’s a combination of Catholic beliefs with the Yoruba’s vodun beliefs. The Yoruba, an African people, are typically from Nigeria, Benin and Togo. West Africa.
Anyways, back to the Celts and Catholicism.
Now when missionaries first rolled up to Ireland and tried to spread Catholicism, you could imagine it didn’t go over well - pagan Celtic beliefs are so different from Catholicism. I mean if you’ve ever been around very religious Catholics, or very religious anyone to be honest, they shun paganism.
But when All Saints Day moved to November 1st, Samhain, and it honored spirits, you could see perhaps how the two combined and morphed into something new - cultural syncretism again. All Saints Day took on some characteristics of Samhain [SAH-win], and vice versa. And All Souls Day, was later moved to November 2nd, another link to the pagan Celts who believed their dead could walk amongst them again on Samhain. Apparently this did the trick, and Celts started converting.
The word Halloween, by the way, comes from All Hallows Eve, the eve of All Saint’s Day - October 31st.
So we now know that Samhain [SAH-win] transformed and was melded with All Saint’s Day. And we know that Halloween comes from All Hallow’s Eve. But how did that turn into trick-or-treating, Spirit Halloween stores, and terrible costumes?
Well, let’s talk about immigration to the US. No, really.
Halloween in the US
Some of the earliest colonists who came to Britain’s New World colonies, the Puritans, would have known about these traditions. Yeah, I know, the Puritans weren’t exactly fun… in fact, a friend of mine called them “fun sponges,” which is amazing. I put that in my script for the History Buffs episode on The Crucible, which drops on Halloween 2023. The Puritans shunned Catholic holidays like Halloween, Christmas, Easter, and the lot. So in New England - you know, the heart of the Salem Witch Trials (my second podcast episode, so give it a listen) - not a big fan of Halloween. But other earlier settlers in the Middle colonies would have celebrated. Colonists would have gathered with their indigenous neighbors to celebrate the harvest, share stories of their dead, hand out sweets to the kids, dance, sing - you know, have fun. Oh, and the Americans were the ones to use pumpkins instead of turnips; Pumpkins are indigenous to the Americas, and were much more abundant than the original turnips.
I bet the Puritans were secretly jealous they didn’t celebrate.
In 1820, British author Washington Irving wrote The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, an American ghost story centered around Halloween. This did wonders for Halloween’s popularity in the US. If you haven’t heard of this book, or watched any movies or shows about it, it tells the story of a soldier who lost his head in the American Revolutionary War. At night, he rides around looking for his head, so his body can be whole, and he can move on to the afterlife. The book itself is about a guy who relates this ghost story, and it’s a whole thing with a love affair… anyway. My point is the book really popularized ghost stories, the macabre, death, all things spooky. But this wasn’t the main influx of Samhain’s [SAH-win] traditions - that didn’t happen until the Irish arrived.
The peak of Irish immigration to the US was between 1845-1855. If you want more details on that, go listen to my episode on the Irish Potato Famine, which is episode 22. That feels like ages ago by now!
With Irish immigrants came Irish traditions, and Halloween was part of that. Remember - the spooky parts of it that were connected to Samhain [SAH-win] were there to convert the Celts 1000 years before, right? That doesn’t mean all of the Catholic world practiced Halloween and All Saints Day like the Celts. I mean, the whole Catholic world doesn’t practice Dia de los Muertos, right? And yet that’s rooted in Catholic faith.
Anyways. Interested in these new Irish traditions and mythologies, the American public loved the idea of Halloween. A new cultural syncretism was happening - a combination of traditional Halloween and Samhain [SAH-win] beliefs with the growing American culture of the 19th century, that’s the 1800s.
Halloween remained a community event. You’d dress up in a costume and go door to do, asking for food and money. Younger girls even attempted white magic - doing little tricks to find out the name of their future husband. Go listen to the Salem episode for more on that, or even watch The Crucible episode I did for HistoryBuffs on YouTube. But that’s where trick came from, adn we know that all the way back in the ancient Celtic Samhain days there were treats to celebrate the harvest. Trick-or-treat!
Over time, Halloween in the US became less secular - that means less religious. It wasn’t about celebrating the Saints, or honoring the dead - it was about communities coming together, sharing candy, celebrating the macabre with fun costumes. It took the community aspects of Samhaim and made them uniquely American - meaning, it revolves around money and sugary food. When the movie industry picked up Halloween and started making spooky horror films about it, then it really became part of our cultural traditions. Apparently, Americans collectively spend around $6 billion a year on Halloween - the second largest commercial holiday after Christmas.
But this Halloween, just remember the traditions that started it all - the Celtic fire festival of Samhain [SAH-win]. Try to remember that the boundaries between our world and the Otherworld are at their thinnest, and on that cold Halloween night, when ghouls and faeries are all around you… you may be dragged away into the supernatural realm. Hopefully you’ll have a big ole bucket of candy to keep you company.
Outro
Thanks for joining me for this episode of A Popular History of Unpopular Things. My name is Kelli Beard, and I hope you’ve enjoyed the story of the history of Halloween. Thank you for supporting my podcast, and if you haven’t already checked out my other episodes, go have a listen!
You can also support me and the show on Patreon - just look up a popular history of unpopular things and join as a cannibal, an explorer, or a historian.
Be sure to follow my podcast, available wherever you listen, so you know when new episodes are dropped. And stay tuned to get a popular history of unpopular things.
