Allantide (Cornish), All-Hallow's Tide ("Alhalwyn-tyd," Germanic), All Souls' Day (Christian), Calan Gaeaf or Hollantide (Welsh), Halloween (secular American), Kala-Goanv (Breton), Sauin (Manx), Samhain (Modern Irish), Samhiunn (Scottish Gaelic), Trinouxtion Samonii (Gaulish from the Coligny Calendar).
what is Halloween for the Celts/ Pagans?
After the harvest, the Celtic year began with its dark Winter half, when the Earth rested and fertility was renewed. It is celebrated on the eve of November 1 as the Celts measured the day from sunset to sunset, although some evidence suggests it was observed as late as November 11. In the Irish tale The Wasting Sickness of Cuchulainn, Samhain is celebrated for a total of seven days – three days before, the day of, and three days after.
Samhain (pronounced /sow-en/) was a time when spirits could mix freely with humans, when the veil between the physical world and the Otherworld was thin. This suspension of time extended to the laws of society, so that many kinds of boisterous behavior could be indulged. This feast marked the distinction between the joys of Harvest and the hardships of the approaching Winter. Samhain was a time of divination and a time of adjustment from outdoor to indoor activities, many of which split down gender lines.
In origin, Samhain was a pastoral festival, held to assist the tribe's fertility, to honor the ancestors, provide protection from evil forces, and repay the gods (and later the saints who replaced them) for the tribe's plentiful Harvest. In some areas, several beasts were sacrificed whose life-energy was believed to replenish the soil. A portion of the meat also was sometimes given to the lord or chieftain and also to the deities of the tribe. A portion of the crops also may have been left in the fields unharvested, the due given to the spirits of the land.
The assemblies of the five Irish provinces at the Hill of Tara, the seat of the kings of Ireland, took place at Samhain and was marked by horse races, fairs, markets, pastoral assembly rites, political discussions and ritual mourning for the passage of Summer. In the Christian tradition, these dates are celebrated as All Souls' Day and All Saints Day.
An ancient Irish story tells of how on the eve of this day, An Cailleach, literally "old woman" or "veiled one," drinks from the ancient Well of Youth at dawn.
Customs
* In the Scottish Highlands, many crofts had their own bonfire, or samhnag, but one house was usually a popular gathering place. In early Celtic tradition, Samhain was closely associated with burial mounds, or cairns, which were believed to be entrances to the Otherworld. In Fortingall (in Perthshire), a samhnag was built on a mound known as Carn nam Marbh, "The Mound of the Dead." Local folklore says that the mound contained the bodies of plague victims and is actually a Bronze Age tumulus. A stone, known as the Clach a' Phaigh, "the Plague Stone," crowned the mound. Once the bonfire was lit, the participants would join hands and dance around it, both Sunwise and anti-Sunwise. As the blaze waned, the younger attendants would take part in leaping games over the flame. No guisers appeared in this particular tradition, the bonfire was the sole center of attention.
* In the Highlands, after sunset many of the youth carried a blazing torch and circuited the boundaries of their farms in order to protect the family from the Faeries and malevolent forces. New fire, kindled from the sacred communal blaze, was then brought into each house. Like the Beltaine fire, the Samhain bonfire was most likely made from tein-eigin, or need-fire, fire made from the friction of two pieces of wood.
sorry it is cut and paste from another site i would have explained it myself but I'm sort on time. But yes this is what I celebrate along with Halloween.
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