Legends from "The Book of Halloween"

The Book of Halloween is an obscure little tome from 1919 or thereabouts, full of the legendry and lore of Hell's Christmas (to use a term I invented). Within it, we're greeted with the strange customs and creepy lore of this twisted season of terror. As an example, in Scotland, it is said the "Samhanach," a goblin, goes about on November Eve, stealing babies from their cribs. Perhaps he blows the icy breath of Hades upon their pudgy, unsuspecting faces. But, off with them he flies, gliding into the night, presumably, like Krampus, in a sack slung over his shoulder. And whence goeth he? No one has ever found out. (At least, none who lived.)

If you sit at a crossroads on a three-legged stool, at midnight no less, the voices of fairy folk are supposed to give you the roster of the condemned to die. Throw out a few articles of clothing to them, however, and the doomed party will be spared.

Not so fortunate the poor, unbaptized babes said to be used for their fat to rub the sacred wand, left in the bed by a witch. Such women were surrounded by their cats, and their devilish familiars, and, anointing themselves with the fat (a noxious concoction that produced, most likely, a mild hallucinatory state), they were said to disappear up the hearth and through the chimney, to ride the wild wings of the night to the dark, Hallowmass revels, wherein the Dark Lord held sway over all.

The "Wee Folk" or "Good People" (i.e. the Fairies), were said to emerge from their secret realm when the veil between this world and the world beyond was at its thinnest. They might steal the child from the crib, replacing him with the "Changeling", a hideous mockery of the abducted infant, who could only be ferreted out with vile abuse (and we wonder how often this occurred); or, by the extraordinary act of boiling eggshells, an act that would cause the Changeling to sit up in bed, point, and exclaim, "Why that's the most incredible thing of all the incredible things that ever I've seen!" In which case afterward, the child will fall back stone dead.

Oracles and Death Tokens

Halloween was a great time for telling the future, and there are many old folk methods of divination in the Book of Halloween. From casting nuts into the hearth to leading a blindfolded man to a pitcher of filthy water and one of clean, telling the future was something that was accomplished quite easily on the cusp of "Hallowe'en," when the death of the Sun (some say symbolized in the stories of Arthur, King of the Britons, whose sword Excalibur was a solar "cross," and whose death saw him depart for "Western Lands").

One form of divination was "winnowing three ears of imaginary corn," while standing alone in the barn on Halloween. When this action had been commenced, the winnower was said to see the apparition of the one to whom she would be wed pass through the door of the barn, and out the back.

Unfortunately for one woman, this did not end well. Instead of seeing her future husband come in and depart, she saw a floating casket come in through the barn door, float past her in the gloom, and exit out the back. Within a short time, she was, indeed, dead.

Children, it is needless to say, went about on Halloween night dressed as "bogies,", carven turnips keeping the spirits at bay as much as their ugly, made-up faces. They may pronounce a trick or a treat, but most often a trick we take it. They black the turnip from forehead to teeth, and, inside, a lighted candle can call forth the spirits.

(It is said the apparition of the living presages trouble. If said apparition walks toward you, the trouble is past. If that ghost walks away from whoever sees it, that man or woman will DIE.)

Death was called forth by the witches, who made love with the Devil on Hallowmass (the Christians, attempting to cleanse the pagans of their beliefs, built the edifice of their holy celebrations atop the ancient ruins of Ballim; hence, Halloween became "Hallowmass," and November 1st, "All Souls Day"), eating no bread or salt, drinking their wine from a horse's skull, kissing the Devil's posteriors (the Devil having joined them by riding a goat to the celebration, one with a flaming torch betwixt its horns). A death token, of course, is any sign or omen that presages the death of a loved one or friend, such as a picture falling from the wall, or three stout raps on the headboard. A clock was said to stop when a man had died in the house; a knock at the door might presage death is, when answered, no one was standing there.

Cult of the Dead

While laying a cabbage stalk over the door lentil to discover your true love was a Halloween game as silly as bobbing for apples, it should never be taken that the ancients viewed Halloween as anything less than a serious commemoration of the souls of the dead, the departed loves whose life had disappeared beyond the veil, and as a way to appease the stern Lord of the Dead, the implacable foe of mankind who carried a scythe in one hand, an hourglass in the other.

On Halloween, we celebrate with candy and dancing. We luxuriate by the warm glow of our television screens. In ancient times, we celebrated by fire and blood. The veil was thinnest, the doorway cast open, and beneath the forts of Ireland and Scotland, the Wee Folk held court over a vast hidden world of buried treasure and stolen souls, where time passed differently. And some may well think they still do.

Happy Halloween.