30 October 2009

Halloween in Britain

Halloween (correctly spelt Hallowe’en) on 31 October is celebrated in many countries around the world and has become more popular as the years have gone by. What started as a religious pagan holiday has turned into a fun day for children dressing up and attending special Halloween parties.

Hallowe'en comes from All Hallow Even the eve of All Hallows day (1 Nov All Saints Day) - hallow is an archaic English word for 'saint'.

Where did it begin?
Halloween has its origins in the ancient Celtic festival (pre-Christian) known as Samhain which is a celebration of the end of the harvest season in Gaelic culture, and is sometimes regarded as the Celtic new year.

Halloween Today - the hype and commercialisation
Halloween today is a commercial enterprise making million of pounds for shops owners (second only to Christmas). Shops started selling their halloween merchandise several weeks ago, some even before it was October! Shelves are crammed full of plastic pumpkins, plastic skulls, dressing up clothes for witches, ghouls etc and loads of specially wrapped 'Halloween sweets'. Many items are scary, frightening, and as a result are very attractive to children.

Hallowen is fun
Many children in Britain look forward to Halloween. They enjoy dressing up, making pumpkin lanterns and going to Halloween parties. Some will go trick and treating with their parents.

Halloween is bad
Many people in Britain are becoming increasingly concerned about the potential for anti-social behaviour and criminal activity under the cloak of trick-or-treat. There are some young people who are unfortunately spoiling the 'fun' by using threatening behaviour.

Many Christians do not like the focus on evil/darkness.

Read more
The History of Halloween Why do we celebrate halloween?
Traditions of Halloween So why do we do what we do on Halloween?
Superstitions of Halloween
Fascinating facts about Halloween
Posted by at 16:34
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3 comments:

  1. I'm sixty-three years old, born in north Wales, but spent most of my childhood in southeast London. This Hallowe'en business puzzles me, because it was non-existed when I was young. Guy Fawkes or Bonfire night was the living tradition at that time. The name 'Hallowe'en' was known academically, but the dressing-up and hocus pocus is an import from north America in the last thirty years - a tradition that goes back all the way to yesterday ! I'm not detracting from the origins in Britain, in the distant past, but there was no celebration by the young of Hallowe'en in my childhood.
    I suspect that there is a subtle connivance on the part of officialdom and other destroyers of true traditions to eclipse Guy Fawkes because of the dangers of fireworks. Bonfire night was never celebrated on anyday but November the fifth, except if it fell on a Sunday. The idea of firework displays on the nearest weekend is also a new thing.
    Let's support genuine traditions and not commercial gimmicks. Do you remember the stock request from children, fifty years ago, in London ? " a penny for the Guy , mister ? "
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  2. I am 49 and have moved abroad 7 years ago. I recently needed to give a talk at an English Language school and used your site for info. I have been reminded of the wonderful traditions we had as children with such things as Harvest Festivals and Bonfire Night, particularly ""Penny for the Guy"" Almost every second house had a bonfire and fireworks, so it was a wonderful evening. I do remember Halloween but not in the Trick or Treat style which has obviously been borrowed from our American cousins and seems to be a good excuse for South east children to throw eggs at your windows. Everything is so organised and commercial these days, it seems to have lost that home made and all in together appeal which is what the best memories are made of. I do remember peeling and orange throwing it over my shoulder and then sleeping with it under my pillow (Halloween night) You were then supposed to dream of your future love. There were a couple of other hocus pocus things that we did but certainly no Trick or treating.
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  3. My own personal experiences of Halloween from when I was a child do not different all that much from those already mentioned. But, I do remember that it wasn't quite as commercialised as it now seems. You might have been able to get hold of some kind of costume or mask in order to dress up for the part, but this wasn't common practice. The simple fact that people didn't have the money to buy such items. Pumpkins were unheard of and the best that we could managed was a large swede! (For those who don't know, a swede is a root vegetable, larger and fatter than a turnip, which assumably came orginally from Sweden.) We would spend time hollowing out this vegetable, cutting a face in one side, placing a small candle, (it had to be small, as swedes weren't all that big. Even the big ones!), in the middle and putting the, 'lid', back on it. It worked well for it's purpose. We would then go out on Halloween night, (only on the one night, rather than every night of that week), and knock on people's door in the local neighbourhood, (those people's houses who you knew, mainly), and ask them, 'penny to keep the witches away.' To which they'd usually give you some small change. No threats or ultimatum was issued. Apparently, things have changed a lot, and there are those, youths', (they're not children in the sense of little ones having a bit of fun), who practically exhort people into giving out cash under threat of having their property damaged. As always, it's the small-minded minority of idiots who want to spoil things for the sensible majority.

    As Halloween was only a week or so before Bonfire night, it's hard to not want to mention watching fireworks being let off in your own back garden, before going to the neighbours, sitting on their wall and watching there's too! People really didn't mind this. In fact, they liked the company. The combination of seeing fireworks and a bonfire, and having the smoke and heat from the flame warming your face against the cold night's sky, then going inside to eat some jacket potatoes, is something I shall always remember fondly. But, of course, there is the down-side to it all. When I was young, you did, admittedly, get a few youths letting off fireworks in the run-up to the 5th of November, but they did so more out of fun than anything else. They never really bothered people, and in fact, went out of their way to find somewhere isolated to, 'play', with them. Now, it seems that youths go out of their way to use fireworks as a kind of, 'weapon', in order to terrorise people.

    How times have changed.
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