My son, Iolar, has been asking me for the last couple years to establish a family tradition of celebrating the four Celtic fire festivals. So, now that we just moved to Portland, Oregon, a climate not unlike that of our Northwest European Celtic ancestors, I thought it would be a good time to start. And of course, since the Celtic notion of time always begins with the dark half, it makes sense to start with Samhain (pronounced saun or sa'wen).
Most of what I know about Celtic lore and tradition comes from years of research, with special attention to the writings of Alwyn and Brinley Rees and Peter Beresford Ellis, as well as to various translations of the Book of Invasions (Lebor Gabála Érenn). These writings are very thoughtful and discriminate authentic tradition and heritage from neo-paganism of the 19th and 20th centuries.
The word "samhain" means something like "summer's end" and is also the Gaelic (and Celtic cognates) name for the month of November. Hence, Halloween is called Oicha Shamhna (November Eve) in Gaelic. The Celtic lunar calendar, recorded in the Coligny tablet and also perhaps the Kerbstone at Knowth, begins with the month of Samhain. It marks the beginning of the dark half of the year and is associated with watery depths. It is in the dark waters that all life is conceived and formed. Birth or coming into being happens later, at the beginning of the light half of the year (Bealtaine). Functionally, the Celts did two important things on Samhain: 1) honor the ancestors and recently deceased friends and relatives, and 2) reconvene the entire tribe.
Honoring the dead is an ancient tradition common to pretty much all cultures. I don't think that it is in any way particular to Celtic heritage. There may be some customs that local Celtic clans adhered to, but I think we can be creative and invent our own family custom. Since my daughter, Brighid, is half-Mexican, we have incorporated Día de los Muertos customs in the past. Samhain has nothing to do with devil-worship or human sacrifice. People who propagate such nonsense have an agenda of wiping out the old ways of the Celtic world and erasing its historical role in the Gregorian calendar through its descendent Halloween (All Hallows Eve).
The second function of Samhain is pretty interesting. On the Eve of November, all flames in the country (Ireland in this case) were extinguished. And all people of the tribe (Tuatha) met at the Hill of Tlaghta for the big bonfire (by compulsion, no less). After the fire was ritually ignited, the people were said to have been blessed by a single flame. And every household took some of this flame back to their home to ignite their own hearth fires with. In this way, each year every single hearth fire in the land originated from the same source. One flame - one people.
Most of what I know about Celtic lore and tradition comes from years of research, with special attention to the writings of Alwyn and Brinley Rees and Peter Beresford Ellis, as well as to various translations of the Book of Invasions (Lebor Gabála Érenn). These writings are very thoughtful and discriminate authentic tradition and heritage from neo-paganism of the 19th and 20th centuries.
The word "samhain" means something like "summer's end" and is also the Gaelic (and Celtic cognates) name for the month of November. Hence, Halloween is called Oicha Shamhna (November Eve) in Gaelic. The Celtic lunar calendar, recorded in the Coligny tablet and also perhaps the Kerbstone at Knowth, begins with the month of Samhain. It marks the beginning of the dark half of the year and is associated with watery depths. It is in the dark waters that all life is conceived and formed. Birth or coming into being happens later, at the beginning of the light half of the year (Bealtaine). Functionally, the Celts did two important things on Samhain: 1) honor the ancestors and recently deceased friends and relatives, and 2) reconvene the entire tribe.
Honoring the dead is an ancient tradition common to pretty much all cultures. I don't think that it is in any way particular to Celtic heritage. There may be some customs that local Celtic clans adhered to, but I think we can be creative and invent our own family custom. Since my daughter, Brighid, is half-Mexican, we have incorporated Día de los Muertos customs in the past. Samhain has nothing to do with devil-worship or human sacrifice. People who propagate such nonsense have an agenda of wiping out the old ways of the Celtic world and erasing its historical role in the Gregorian calendar through its descendent Halloween (All Hallows Eve).
The second function of Samhain is pretty interesting. On the Eve of November, all flames in the country (Ireland in this case) were extinguished. And all people of the tribe (Tuatha) met at the Hill of Tlaghta for the big bonfire (by compulsion, no less). After the fire was ritually ignited, the people were said to have been blessed by a single flame. And every household took some of this flame back to their home to ignite their own hearth fires with. In this way, each year every single hearth fire in the land originated from the same source. One flame - one people.
