Halloween in Ireland — Samhain, Where It All Began

How Samhain became Halloween

Neolithic — Tombs that face the Samhain sunrise
Some passage tombs in Ireland are aligned with the sunrise around Samhain and Imbolc. That shows the time of year mattered to their builders; it does not show they kept a festival called Samhain.
Early medieval — Samain in the manuscripts
The medieval Irish texts put great gatherings at Samhain. Echtra Cormaic says the Feast of Tara was held every seventh Samhain, when the high king laid down new laws. It is the night the síde, the mounds, open and the Otherworld comes through.
By 800 — All Saints arrives on the same day
By about 800 churches in Ireland and Northumbria were already keeping a feast of all saints on 1 November, and All Souls followed on the 2nd. From then on the old festival and the Christian feast of the dead occupied the same nights.
1500s–1800s — Guising, pranks and fortune-telling
Mumming and guising at Samhain were first recorded in 16th-century Scotland, and later in parts of Ireland, the Isle of Man and Wales. In the late 18th century people went house to house with sticks collecting food for the feast; in 19th-century southern Ireland the guisers brought a hobby horse, the Láir Bhán, the white mare. Pranks were common enough that it was called Mischief Night in places.
1800s — The emigrants take it to America
Irish and Scottish emigrants brought guising, pranks and the carved lantern with them. In America the turnip gave way to the pumpkin, which is bigger and far easier to carve.
Late 1800s — The 'Celtic New Year' is invented
John Rhys and James Frazer suggested Samhain had been the Celtic New Year and a festival of the dead. The idea spread everywhere. The historian Ronald Hutton calls the evidence for the new year flimsy.

Samhain in the early Irish tales

These are stories written down by Christian scribes, mostly between the 9th and 12th centuries. They tell us what the writers believed about Samhain, not what anyone did in pagan Ireland.

Tochmarc Emire (The Wooing of Emer)
A 10th-century tale that lists Samhain as the first of the four seasonal festivals of the year.
Echtra Cormaic (Cormac's Adventure)
Says the Feast of Tara was held every seventh Samhain, hosted by the high king, when new laws and duties were laid down.
Serglige Con Culainn (Cúchulainn's Sickbed)
Says the Ulaid's Samhain festival lasted a week: Samhain itself and the three days either side.
Echtra Nerai (The Adventure of Nera)
On Samhain night King Ailill of Connacht sets his household a test of bravery. Nera takes it, carries a dead man on his back in search of a drink, and sees a fairy host burn the king's hall: a vision of what will happen next Samhain unless it is prevented.
Aided Chrimthainn maic Fidaig (The Killing of Crimthann)
Mongfind poisons her brother at a feast and is made to drink first. The Middle Irish writer adds that Samhain was also called the Festival of Mongfind, when 'women and the rabble' petitioned her.
The Morrígan, the Dagda and Óengus
The Morrígan and the Dagda meet at Samhain before the battle against the Fomorians; in Tochmarc Étaíne Samhain is the day Óengus claims Brú na Bóinne.

What people did on the night

The turnip lantern
In 19th-century Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England, turnips and mangel-wurzels were hollowed out, carved with grotesque faces and lit. The pumpkin is the American substitute. The Stingy Jack story, of a drunk who tricks the Devil and wanders with a coal in a turnip, is sometimes told as the origin of the name, alongside the will-o'-the-wisp lights seen over bogs.
The barmbrack
Bairín breac, a fruit loaf with things baked into it: a ring for marriage within the year, a coin for wealth, a pea for no marriage that year, a stick for a quarrelsome one, a rag for bad luck. The ones sold in shops now keep only a toy ring, because food safety rules took out the rest.
Guising and 'false faces'
Children in costume going door to door for food or coins. In Ireland and Scotland the masks were called false faces, and until the 2000s the thing Irish children shouted at the door was 'Help the Halloween Party'.
Divination games
Games to see who you would marry and whether you would live the year, a common part of the night in Irish and British homes in recent centuries.
The parshell
In southern Ireland a small cross of sticks and straw, the parshell, was woven at Samhain, much like a Brigid's cross.
Snap-apple and apple bobbing
Apples and hazelnuts ran through the night's games. Apples were bobbed for in a tub of water; or a rod was hung from the ceiling with an apple on one end and a lit candle on the other, spun, and each player tried to catch the apple with their teeth. Daniel Maclise's painting Snap-Apple Night (1833) shows these games at a Halloween party in Ireland.
Nuts on the fire
Two hazelnuts were set to roast by the fire, one named for the person roasting them and one for the person they hoped to marry. If the nuts jumped away from the heat it was a bad sign; if they roasted quietly it foretold a good match. An apple peeled in one long strip and tossed over the shoulder was said to land in the shape of the future spouse's initial.
The púca and the blackberries (folk belief)
The púca, a shape-changing spirit that might come as a horse, goat, cat or dog, belongs to Samhain in folk belief. In some places it was said to spoil the wild fruit at the start of November, so blackberries were not to be eaten after Halloween, and 1 November was the púca's own day. This is folklore recorded in the 19th and 20th centuries, not history.
Candles for the dead
In 19th-century Ireland candles were lit and prayers said for the souls of the dead around All Saints and All Souls.

What the children wrote down, 1937–39

In the Schools' Collection, pupils across the State recorded what their families did on Hallowe'en. A few of them, summarised from the pages on dúchas.ie; follow the link for the child's own words.

Boyle, Co. Roscommon ↗ · Abbeytown Convent N.S.
Pookas and other evil spirits were said to go from house to house on Hallowe'en night, so everyone stayed in; the woman of the house baked a sweet cake with a ring in it.
Clonmel, Co. Tipperary ↗ · Clonmel Convent
Written in November 1938: people stayed indoors after nightfall and gathered at the fire for snap-apple and burning nuts.
Clonmel, Co. Tipperary ↗ · Clonmel Convent
Calls snap-apple the favourite game 'then and now', played on a cross of two pointed sticks with apples on the ends.
Kiltiernan, Co. Galway ↗ · Cilltighearnáin
Dated 2 November 1938: three plates, one with a ring, one with clay, one with water. A blindfolded player puts a finger in one, and the ring means a wedding soon.
Leitrim Beg, Co. Galway ↗ · Liathdruim
Peel a potato in one piece on All Hallowe'en and hang the rind on the door latch: the first man in will have the same name as the man you will marry.
Inis Meáin, Co. Galway ↗ · Inis Meáin
In Irish, November 1938: apples for everyone, a party for the young, ducking in a tub for apples and money. The old people said no blackberries should be eaten from that night on, because the fairies had them.
Doonloughan, Co. Galway ↗ · Dúnlocháin
In Irish: anyone out that night might get a ride on the púca, and a snail left on a swept floor would trace letters foretelling what would happen before the year was out.
Baunmore, Co. Galway ↗ · An Bán Mór
In Irish: a man out on Samhain night meets Séan an Lampa, a lantern-carrying spirit whose work every Oíche Shamhna is to lead people astray.

Search them all: “Halloween” ↗ · “Hallowe'en” ↗ · “Oíche Shamhna” ↗

1930s folklore, county by county

The Schools' Collection covers the 26 counties of the State. Each link opens the stories that mention the county; Dúchas's search does not combine words, so to narrow to Halloween use the County filter on the Halloween search ↗.

Samhain places you can stand in

Tlachtga, the Hill of Ward · County Meath
Four earthen rings on a hill near Athboy. Later folklore made it the place where druids lit the Samhain fire. The archaeology is real: ritual gatherings, feasting and intense burning there from the Bronze Age to the late Iron Age.
Oweynagat, Rathcroghan · County Roscommon
The cave of the cats at Medb's royal site, called in the medieval texts the dwelling of the Morrígan. The tales say otherworldly creatures came out of it each Samhain, and the warrior Nera's adventure begins there on Samhain night.
Tara · County Meath
Where the medieval tales put the great Samhain feast of the high kings.

What gets said, and whether it holds

“Halloween is the Celtic New Year” Doubtful
The idea comes from John Rhys and James Frazer in the late 19th century. Ronald Hutton, the historian of the ritual year, calls the evidence flimsy. It may be true; nobody can show it.
“Halloween is just Samhain, unchanged” No
Modern Halloween is three things layered: the Gaelic Samhain, the Christian All Hallows and All Souls on the same nights since about 800, and the version Irish and Scottish emigrants made in America.
“The jack-o'-lantern was always a pumpkin” No
In Ireland it was a turnip or a mangel-wurzel. The pumpkin was the emigrants' substitute in America.
“Druids made human sacrifices at Samhain” Unproven
The sacrifice stories come from Christian writers centuries later, notably about Crom Cruach. Tlachtga shows fire and feasting in the archaeology, not the sacrifices the folklore describes.

Quick answers

Did Halloween start in Ireland?

Largely, yes. Samhain, the Gaelic festival on 31 October to 1 November, originated in Ireland and was kept in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man. Irish and Scottish emigrants carried its customs, guising, pranks and carved lanterns, to North America in the 19th century, and American Halloween spread them worldwide. The Christian All Hallows, kept on 1 November in Ireland by about 800, is the other half of the name and the story.

How do you pronounce Samhain?

SOW-in, rhyming with 'cow-in'. In Irish it is written Samhain and means November; Halloween night is Oíche Shamhna.

Was Samhain the Celtic New Year?

Possibly, but it is not established. John Rhys and James Frazer proposed it in the late 19th century, and the historian Ronald Hutton calls the evidence flimsy.

Why did the Irish carve turnips?

Turnips and mangel-wurzels were what there was. In the 19th century they were hollowed, carved with faces and lit at Halloween in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England. Emigrants in America used the pumpkin instead because it is larger and softer.

What Halloween games did Irish children play?

Snap-apple, apple bobbing, roasting pairs of hazelnuts on the fire to foretell a marriage, and other fortune-telling games. Children writing for the Schools' Collection in 1937 to 1939 described these, along with the ring in the cake and the belief that the púca was abroad that night.

Where were the Samhain sites in Ireland?

The medieval tales and later tradition point to Tara and Tlachtga (the Hill of Ward) in Meath and the cave of Oweynagat at Rathcroghan in Roscommon. Tlachtga is said in tradition to be where the Samhain fire was lit; excavation there found ritual gatherings and intense burning from the Bronze Age to the late Iron Age.

What is in a barmbrack?

A fruit loaf with objects baked in: a ring meant marriage within the year, a coin wealth, a pea no marriage that year, a stick a quarrelsome marriage, a rag bad luck. Shop bracks today contain only a toy ring.

Elsewhere on the site

The púca and the creatures of the night The Morrígan and the old gods Samhain and the other quarter days St Brigid's Day Wren Day

Sources

Kept a Halloween custom in your family that is not here — a game, a food, what the children said at the door? Tell us.