Halloween

Halloween is believed to have stemmed from an ancient Celtic celebration in Ireland and Scotland called Samhain. The tradition included dressing up in costumes and making noise in the street to make evil spirits go away. The Catholic Church later introduced All Saints Day or All Hallows Day, the night before being called All Hallows Eve. Many traditions from both holidays merged together and over time All Hallows Eve was shortened to Halloween.

Today Halloween is celebrated in a similar way, in Ireland, the United States and Canada children dress up in costumes for Halloween. In modern day costumes have shifted from scary to just about anything ranging from celebrities to appliances like a TV.

Other modern traditions for celebrating Halloween around the world is by decorating houses and businesses with scary decorations. Last year, consumers spent a whopping 6.9 billion dollars on Halloween in the United States alone! Anoka, Minnesota is the Halloween capital of the world.

Some other popular ways in which Halloween is celebrated is by pumpkin carving, this tradition became popular in the United States with the increase of Irish immigrants; the concept was one of using vegetables to scare evil spirits away. The Irish discovered the pumpkin which is a popular vegetable around fall harvest and they began using it for scaring spirits at Halloween.

The phase ‘trick or treat’ is very popular around Halloween, children will go from house to house around their neighborhood knocking on doors and asking trick or treat , the ‘treat’ will be a piece of candy if there is no candy the children will perform a ‘trick’ meaning something mischievous on the owners’ house. This tradition also traces back to an ancient practice called souling and guising.

Here are some other interesting facts about Halloween that your children may be interested in;

WHY BLACK CATS

• Black cats were believed to protect witches and in most countries even here in Russia are perceived as bad luck, so it is not uncommon to see them at Halloween.

WHY ARE LIGHTS PLACED IN PUMPKINS

• Halloween pumpkins are also known as Jack O’ Lanterns and are often lit up like lanterns, this name came from an Irish folktale. Legend has it that at the end of the story, he only had a burning coal to light the way which he put inside a turnip.

WHY IS ORANGE AND BLACK USED FOR DECORATING DURING HALLOWEEN

• You may have seen the colours orange and black a lot during Halloween, the orange colour symbolizes autumn and harvest while the black symbolizes death.

It doesn’t matter how you celebrate Halloween one thing is for sure, children love dressing up in their costumes and celebrating.