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How did it become Halloween?

The Pagans' Festival transformed into Halloween through a blend of Ancient Celtic traditions, Roman influences, Christian church holidays, and many more. It is not confirmable which traditions created Halloween because a lot of different religions and places had similar ideas that came together with the idea of Halloween. It's believed that after the Celtic festival of Samhain there was All Saints' Day and then All Souls' Day, formed by popes and church leaders in the catholic church over the years. All Saints' Day is the day right after Halloween (November 1st) and it is believed that the name Halloween came from All Hallows' Eve, the preparatory night before All Saints' Day. All Souls' Day is November 2nd, which was dedicated to honoring the dead and praying for them. this whole ceremony was meant to honor the dead, which is how both the Halloween name and the scary concept of it most likely came from.

The history of halloween

By Aniese Colon

With the spooky season coming up this month, you might start to wonder: "What is Halloween about?" To figure this out we must explore Halloween's haunted history. Diving back more than 2,000 years ago, it is believed that the idea of Halloween orginated from a Pagan religious ceremony called the Celtic festival of Samhain. In this festival, they would celebrate the upcoming harvest at the end of summer. However, they would also light bonfires and wear costumes to repel ghosts because they believed during the night of october 31st, the line between the living and the supernatural was crossed, which would allow ghouls and ghosts to cross over from the dead. They wore the costumes to blend in with the souls so they would not come after them. The costumes the Pagans wore were made of animal skin or even heads.

Where did the traditions come from?

In Roman tradition, there is a goddess named Pomona who is the goddess of fruit and trees, whose symbol was the apple. This created the idea of bobbing for apples, which was once romantic since it was believed the first person to pick an apple would get married first. In medieval England, There was a tradition on All Souls' Day called "Souling" where poor people and children would go door-to-door giving out prayers to the dead as a trade so they would be given small square pastries called soul cakes. This is believed to have started the idea of Trick or Treating. The costumes came from the Pagan festival where they first used it to ward off ghosts.

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