The Origins of Halloween
may not be what you'd expect,
but still Quite Scary
Celtic Halloween- Have you ever wondered why we dress up in spooky costumes on Halloween? The scary holiday has a very long history dating back to an ancient Celtic festival called Samhain. Over 2,000 years ago in Ireland this was a festival to mark the new season and the November 1 harvest. The festival rang in the fall season, and at a time when it was getting darker and maybe even more scary in the world, and this season was soon associated with death. The Celts were superstitious folks, and they thought this day was the time where death and life collided. On the night of October 31 it was rumored the dead returned to earth as ghosts, roaming the land and ruining crops (due to some recent crop rotting events throughout Ireland).
Soon, Priests would predict the future on this day, and this marked an important and hopeful event for the population who relied heavily on the land and natural resources to survive. On October 31, many people believed all trapped Souls were set free from the "land of the dead". So, on this evening townspeople met, bonfires whipped up and groups gathered to burn and sacrifice animals while the Celts donned costumes (sometimes with Animal heads and skin).
Before you start think this is incredibly eerie and dark, it's important to understand the mindset at the time. Some believed the souls of the dead were trapped in bodies of animals, and the only way to free these souls was to sacrifice the animals. Wearing costumes was a symbol of relinquishing the souls to the world. At the end of the celebration people returend home, lit their fires, the ones they extinguished before the party and all was right in the world again.
The holiday has taken many twists and turns over the centuries but these early roots shows deep symbolism in community customs and all derived out of hopefulness and a need for survival.
American Halloween-- After many twists and turns throughout the years Halloween landed in the United States during the Colonial days. The holiday was combined with various other European and Native American traditions to eventually morph into a “party” atmosphere with dressing up and traveling house-to-house to neighbors to "beg" for food and money (the trick or treat tradition began). Soon, playing pranks and party goers would partake in other practical jokes which became part of the new Halloween tradition and borrowed from our European ancestors (hence the toilet paper wrapping of trees today).
By the midcentury in the United States, Halloween became a community-wide holiday with school and community parades and parties, and some believe that due to the Baby Boom of the 1950s it changed into mostly a kid’s celebration. It is interesting to see how traditions change over time to today where Americans ring doorbells for candy dressed in costumes. Huh, from animal sacrifice rituals to candy collection- that's quite a leap!
my Halloween board
left to right-
Tori Golub at Holiday House 2016; right former Greenwich, Ct shop Putnam & Mason
designer Michelle Nussbaume in Veranda
We also know that the dark and edgy feeling (possibly from Halloween) has creeped into our interior design. Take a look at some gorgeous interiors I've covered here on the blog all with a seemingly Halloween-inspired feel. 
