Freebie: Pumpkins!

Do you have your pumpkin yet for Halloween? Here are some nice ones on an antique pumpkin seed packet that I've scanned and cleaned up for you. I hope these will help with your Halloween and Harvest cards and crafts, but you'll have to find real ones for your jack-o-lantern!

Vintage Halloween Witches ~ New Collage Sheets!

I had to show off some of the new collage sheets I've been working on, just in time for Halloween crafts.  Yes, I know it's only August, but crafters tend to always be thinking one holiday ahead!  I'm crazy for Halloween witches and I hope you will enjoy these new vintage Halloween images I don't think you'll find anywhere else ~  including Art Nouveau Witches, some cool Witch Photos, unique Victorian Witches from vintage postcards and ads, Edwardian Witchery, and finally a 1920s Halloween Dance.

Check them out at Lunagirl.com.

Between the Worlds: Part Four

Black Cats & Witches

Cats have long been the objects of much superstition, and they are frequently associated with Halloween.  Cats were sacred to the Druids; it was believed that they had once been human beings.  Perhaps the cat had magical power because it was supposedly the most common "familiar" of witches (probably just the favorite companion of old ladies living alone).  Feline behavior towards a person on Halloween was often taken as an omen.  For example, if a cat jumps into your lap on this night, good luck is foretold.  Probably more prevalent is the belief that cats, particularly black cats, can be ill omens.  Everyone in the U.S. has heard that a black cat crossing your path means bad luck ahead. The bad reputation of the cat may have been a medieval Christian reaction against the honor given them by the pre-Christian Druids.  Medieval Christians burned cats along with accused "witches" (leading to an overpopulation of rats, which bred fleas, which carried the bubonic plague...now that's bad luck).

The figure of the witch is now an integral part of Halloween in our minds, but she may be a relatively late arrival.  How she got there is a story extremely long and complex.  I suspect that originally witches were just another of the various supernatural beings thought to walk or fly about the earth on Halloween.  Witches tended to get confused with sorcerers, who, since they may supposedly used evil spirits to carry out their work, would be particularly active on this night.  

The Real Witches - Wise Old Ladies in the Woods? Some today regard the so-called witches of old Europe as simply survivors from the pre-Christian, nature-focused religions of the ancients.  In other words, pagans who revered nature (not Satan).  The idea of older, traditional folks living off in the woods, continuing their seasonal celebrations, magical beliefs, and herbal medicine, is not far from our image of the witch.   As Christianity gained ascendancy in Europe, witches were reinterpreted through Church dogma and came to be viewed (incorrectly) as Satan-worshippers.  Many of the popular (and often incorrect) notions about witchcraft derived from "confessions" extracted by torture from the accused "witches" of earlier centuries. Most who were executed as witches during the "burning times" were most likely "strange" old ladies living alone in the woods, the mentally ill, midwives and herbalists, people who followed the "old ways" of the Celts, women whose remarkable ugliness or beauty brought attention.....those whose "difference" aroused suspicion in a fearful, ignorant, and tumultuous age.

Bats and owls are associated with Halloween probably because they are nocturnal -- active only at night.  Perhaps they join the spirits to fly about the night sky.  Owls were for thousands of years associated with knowledge and wisdom, especially feminine wisdom, and so are a fitting companion for the witch, the Old Wise Woman.  (Owls were a symbol for Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom, as well.)

The witch's cauldron may represent the "cauldron of Cerridwen" of Celtic myth, source of wisdom and rebirth -- and the direct symbolic predecessor of the Holy Grail.  In myth often one was cut up and boiled in the cauldron, to emerge again reborn in wholeness, health & wisdom The cauldron and later the Grail were believed to be guarded by a hideous woman-beast.  In many Celtic stories it is through this terrifying creature that the magic vessel is finally encountered, and only the person who can accept and kiss her can gain access to the wisdom and renewal she guards.  By embracing the pain and struggle of life we gain wisdom and greater strength.

 

This image of the old witch hovering over her cauldron embodies beautifully the original symbolic meaning of Halloween. 
This is the night when we confront perhaps the ultimate riddle: As winter approaches, the world comes face to face with the power of death and darkness, which holds within it the promise of rebirth.  On the wheel of the year, the cold stillness of the coming winter will take us around again to the warmth and renewal of spring. 

Behind our holiday called Halloween lies the eerie, magical mood of the ancient festival of Samhain and All Hallow's Eve.  Perhaps we would do well to remember some of its original meaning -- not to conjure up real fears again, but rather to rekindle a feeling of wonder toward the great cycle of death and rebirth in nature and in our lives.

All pictures shown are included in Lunagirl's Victorian Holiday Cards Graphics 3-CD set
(Click to see a full description of the set -- over 3,000 vintage images for all holidays!)

Visit Lunagirl.com to see all our Image CDs: Vintage Graphics, Victorian Cards, Vintage Photos, Ads & Labels, Collage Sheets & Ephemera on CD

Entire text copyright 2005, 1983, K. Goode and SummertownSun Publishing, all rights reserved.  Illustrated feature article copyright 2005, SummertownSun Publishing, LLC, all rights reserved. 
This entire text is an original work of authorship, and all intellectual property rights are retained by the author and copyright holder. Any unauthorized copying or reproduction in any form, in whole or in part, is strictly forbidden and a violation of copyright law.  Please contact us for permission if you wish to use parts of this article.

Between the Worlds: Part Three

Jack-o-Lanterns & Halloween Pranks

There is an Irish story explaining the origin of jack-o-lanterns:  It seems a man named Jack was barred from heaven because he was so stingy and forbidden to enter hell because of his practical jokes on the devil. The devil, angered by Jack's practical jokes, threw a live coal at him.  It landed in a half-eaten turnip in Jack's hand, creating the first jack-o-lantern.  (Early jack-o-lanterns were turnips as well as pumpkins and other gourds.)  He is condemned to walk the earth with his lantern until Judgment Day!   Closed out of hell as well as heaven, Jack is suspended between life and death, and thus his jack-o-lantern is particularly appropriate to Halloween.

As a child in the southern U.S. I was told (teasingly) that the grinning pumpkin face in the window helped frighten evil spirits away from the house.  Although this may keep away the spirits of the dead, it seems to have little effect on the pranksters -- young people who become demons for a night and roam the neighborhoods making mischief.  Halloween provides an irresistible opportunity for the practical joker.  If the farmer's outhouse ends up in the creek, or your trees end up full of toilet paper, it was the evil spirits who did it -- once a perfect alibi for the real culprits.  Again, the limits placed on day-to-day behavior were weakened for a night.  today, most of it is of course harmless, although I do wish people wouldn't smash jack-o-lanterns!

Some once-common Halloween pranks, such as window-tapping, gathering vegetables to bombard house fronts and drop down chimneys, and removing carts and other belongings to faraway fields, were practiced in altered form in the United States when I was growing up (with the variation, of course, that we took things from the garage and left them in other neighbors' yards).  Soaping windows (especially car windows), stealing jack-o-lanterns, and "rolling" yards (adorning the trees and shrubs in toilet paper) were also popular.

Halloween Bonfires

Halloween bonfires are direct descendants of Samhain/All Hallow's fires of the Celts, lit in honor of the weakening sun at summer's end.  

The fires helped ward off the growing power of darkness and cold.  Perhaps they were meant to strengthen the fire of the sun by means of sympathetic magic.  They were also a means of purification.  Even in recent times the ashes of the Halloween (and New Years) bonfires were scattered throughout the community to protect against evil powers and fertilize the fields. Every hearth fire was first lit for the new year from the Samhain or new years bonfire.  In ancient times it was considered an act of great impiety to kindle winter fires from any other source.

In parts of England, a large bunch of wood was gathered, dressed as a person, then burned under the name Le Vieux Bout de l'An, "the old end of the year."  Here again we see a similarity to Yule customs -- the traditional Yule log that burnt all night was originally also dressed as a person.  

In Scotland we find the custom called "Burning the Witch," which involved burning an effigy and continued well into modern times.  Guy Fawkes Day, named for a rebel who tried to blow up Parliament around the turn of the seventeenth century and celebrated in England on November 5, also involves the burning of a human effigy and is sometimes combined with the Halloween celebration.

These mock sacrifices represented the death of the old year.  Probably such sacrifices were intended to appease the spirits of the dead, for it was believed that the spirits might continue to disrupt human affairs throughout the year if not properly honored.  People often left food out on the table for the returning dead on Halloween.  (Another ancestor of our trick-or-treating custom.)

Halloween Superstitions & Divination Customs

As it is the beginning of the new year and a time when the everyday and the supernatural were believed to be in such close contact....Halloween was considered the perfect time for divining the future.

The divination traditions associated with Halloween are numerous and fascinating!

There were many superstitions involving mirrors. 

Some believed that if a young woman looked into a mirror at midnight on Halloween, she would see the face of her future husband or true love.  A smooth pond surface or wishing well reflection would also work!  There were similar beliefs about looking into a pond or well at dawn on May Day (Beltane).  Others might gaze into the mirror at midnight on Halloween and see their future revealed.

Mirrors and reflections were long considered magical and mysterious, because the reflection was associated with the soul of the person reflected; a mirror could capture or reveal one's soul.  Some of us are still a little superstitious about breaking a mirror.

APPLES Halloween divination usually involved apples, nuts, grain, or other agricultural products, combining the harvest aspect of the holiday with its magical nature.   Apples were particularly popular, and the apple rites seem to be the customs most often found in the United States.   (To the Celts, a perfect apple was the charm by which one might be admitted to the Otherworld and gain "second sight.")

Many customs involve apple peels.  For example, people would peel apples trying to keep the peel all in one piece; whoever had the longest peel would have the longest life.   Young girls would peel an apple and then throw the long peel over their left shoulder, believing that it would form the initial of their future husband's name!   When bobbing for apples, some believed that the first person to get an apple would be the first to marry.

PUMPKINS Pumpkins are of course another agricultural product always associated with Halloween.  Like apples, they are plentiful in October.  Also like apples, they were sometimes used for divination.  Some ladies reportedly put pumpkins on their heads at midnight on Halloween, to see their future husbands!

TO BE CONTINUED...

© 1983, 2005, all rights reserved. 
This article is an original work of authorship protected under copyright law, and it may not be copied in whole or in part without permission of the author and copyright holder.

Watch for the last installment of our article on the origins of Halloween and its customs -- part four features witches and black cats!