The origins of halloween
Halloween (contraction of All Hallows 'Evening), also known as Halloween
or All Souls' Night, is a Celtic festival which takes place primarily in the
United States, northern Mexico, some provinces in Canada, Ireland and the
United Kingdom on the night of October 31. It originated in the Celtic
festival of Samhain and the Christian holiday of All Saints' Day. In large
part, is a secular celebration but some feel that has a religious
background. Irish immigrants passed versions of the tradition to North
America during the Great Irish Famine of 1840.
The day is often associated with the orange and black and is strongly
associated with symbols like the Jack-o'-lantern. Typical activities include
the famous Halloween trick or treating and costume parties, besides
bonfires, visiting haunted houses, jokes, reading scary stories and viewing
horror films.
Symbols used in
HalloweenThe most representative symbol of Halloween is the previously empty pumpkin with a candle inside. But this tradition has its origins in Ireland, where lanterns usually performed with different types of tubers. The Irish settlers arriving as America made their flashlights with pumpkins and that was when I first became associated carving pumpkins this Halloween eve.In the last century the influence of American cinema has become the holiday of Halloween on Halloween night, a dark and mysterious. The most common symbols of Halloween are inspired by classic horror films, which contain all known figures like Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy and the Werewolf. More modern horror antagonists has a pronounced role in this festival, Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, Leatherface, Jason Voorhees.
Old Witch, Old Witch
Chicken my chicken my creamy crow,
I went to the well to wash my toe,
When I got there the water was low,
What time is it, Old Witch, Old Witch?
What time is it Old Witch?
Old Witch, Old Witch, she lives in a ditch,
And combs her hair with a hickory switch.
She lives on nails and snails and flies
And if you go near she'll wobble her eyes,
Oh, she'll wobble her eyes, Oh, she'll wobble her eyes.
Chicken my chicken my creamy cran,
I went to the well to wash my hand,
When I got there the water was sand,
What time is it, Old Witch, Old Witch?
What time is it Old Witch?
Old Witch, Old Witch, she lives in a ditch,
And combs her hair with a hickory switch.
She's fat as a feather but tight in the middle
And when she talks she sounds like a fiddle.
Oh, she sound like a fiddle! Oh, she sound like a fiddle!
Traditioal songs and
food in Halloween
Spanish All Saints' Day VS Halloween
The Day of All Saints is a Catholic tradition established in honor of All Saints, known and unknown, according to Pope Urban IV, to compensate for any lack in the feasts of the saints during the year by the faithful.In Catholic countries, is celebrated on November 1, while in the Orthodox Church celebrated the first Sunday after Pentecost, but also celebrate the Anglican and Lutheran churches. It venerates the saints who do not have a feast in the liturgical calendar itself. For a holiday tradition is not working.
Today, children dress for the occasion and walk the streets trick or treating from door to door. After knocking at the door children uttered the phrase "trick or treat ',' trick or treating" or "naughty or sweet." If adults give them candy, money or other reward, is interpreted to have accepted the deal. If instead they refuse, the boys spend a little joke, the most common throw eggs or shaving foam against the door.
An old Irish folk tale tells of Stingy Jack, a lazy yet shrewd farmer who uses a cross to trap the Devil. One story says that Jack tricked the Devil into climbing an apple tree, and once he was up there Jack quickly placed crosses around the trunk or carved a cross into the bark, so that the Devil couldn't get down. Another tale says that Jack put a key in the Devil's pocket while he was suspended upside-down.
The Jack-O'-Lantern Legend
Trick - or - treating and other rhymes
I am a ghost,
I am scary and white,
And you see me at night.
I'm a skeleton,Day or nightMy bones are white.
I'm a castle,I've got windows and doors, And ghots under the floors.
I am a broom,
I can sweep and fly
With a witch in the sky.
I´m a pumpkinNext to the doorOn the Halloween nightLook at my face,See my light.
I'm a witch,
I've got a big hat
and a little black cat
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
The story is set circa 1800 in the Dutch settlement of Tarry Town, New York, in a secluded glen called Sleepy Hollow. It tells the story of Ichabod Crane, a lean, lanky, and extremely superstitious schoolmaster from Connecticut, who competes with Abraham “Brom Bones” Van Brunt, the town rowdy, for the hand of 18-year-old Katrina Van Tassel, the daughter and sole child of a wealthy farmer. As Crane leaves a party he attended at the Van Tassel home on an autumn night, he is pursued by the Headless Horseman, who is supposedly the ghost of a Hessian trooper who had his head shot off by a stray cannonball during “some nameless battle” of the American Revolutionary War, and who “rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head”. Ichabod mysteriously disappears from town, leaving Katrina to marry Brom Bones, who was “to look exceedingly knowing whenever the story of Ichabod was related”.
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