SAMHAIN ©
by Tira Brandon-Evans
Samhain, which we call Halloween, All Hallows or All Saints Day, has a very ancient tradition. In Celtic countries, as in the Middle East, a day begins at sunset. Therefore, Samhain starts on All Hallows Eve or Halloween — October 31st — and continues until sunset on November 1st. Our Celtic ancestors anciently celebrated Samhain as New Year’s Day, the first day of their new year.(1) The Norse moved New Year’s Day from Samhain to Yule. Our present day Halloween, November 1st, was designated a feast of all the dead by a Celt, St. Odilon, in 998 CE. Later the church changed that feast to November 2nd and the November 1st celebration was assigned as a day of honor for the saints alone.(2)
At the beginning of a new year, we tend to reflect on the year gone by and prepare for the winter to come. Of course, it is easier to reflect on the year just past if one has kept a journal. Samhain was also the time for settling old debts and reckoning up what one was owed. A part of that settling was making peace and restoring friendships. Samhain means ‘summer’s end’. In addition to being an annual period of reflection it is at this time of the year, when the cold breath of winter stirs the hairs on the nape of the neck, that one pauses to examine one’s own mortality. Samhain marks the beginning of the lunar Year of the Little Sun. The little sun is the moon. After Samhain, as the days grow short and nights lengthen, the moon is seen more than the sun. After the bounty of summer comes the dearth of winter and Samhain stands directly between the two. Samhain is outside of time because it is a threshold time, one of the eight Portals of the Seasons. The laws of nature are suspended at these times. Times of change are also times of danger. As in all times of danger, the tribe gathered to support one another and to honor to their ancestors, the High and Lordly Ones.
In Ireland, the goddess of Samhain is Tlachtga (T’Lach-gah), which means ‘Thunder-bolt Wisdom Woman’. She is the Patroness of Druids and the daughter of Mog Roith, he who commands the Wheel of the Sun. The season was traditionally celebrated at the Hill of Tlachtga, now called the Hill of Ward, in Munster. There the needfire was kindled by the druids on the first New Moon (or according to some — first Full Moon) after the Autumnal Equinox.
Another Irish Goddess, the Morrigan, is said to have mated with the Dagda, the Good God, at Samhain. Like the Cailleach, the Morrigan, is a dark face of the Goddess. She is most often seen on the battlefield, after the battle is over, in the form of a gore crow or raven, pecking the eyes of the dead. Our Celtic ancestors were very fond of war and battle, especially of hand-to-hand combat between champions. There were constant raids on neighboring cattle herds and more or less permanent border disputes between tribes. Around the fire, the bards sang songs, immortalizing the great heroes and glorifying the nobility of war. The Morrigan showed our ancestors the ugly truth about their way of life and so She was regarded with fear and horror. She is the Great Trickster Woman who shakes us up when we become complacent. She holds up the truth about ourselves before our eyes and shoves it into our faces so we cannot ignore it. For this reason She is active at Samhain as we look back over the year gone by and examine ourselves.
In Britain and Wales, it is Cerridwen, the White Sow Goddess, who presides over Samhain. Hers is the Cauldron of Death and Rebirth. She is a goddess of transformation and re-birth. The story of Cerridwen and Taliesin is the archetypal story of shamanic initiation. We know that Cerridwen is a Death Goddess because She possesses the Cauldron of Death and Rebirth, from which and into which all life flows. Another symbol of the Death Goddess is the waning crescent moon, the sickle with which She cuts the corn. Her sickle is the precursor to the scissors with which She cuts the thread of life.
Some of the Samhain faces of the Goddess were common throughout Celtica; the Cailleach (KAL-yack) is one of these. The Cailleach is the dark face of Brighid. Her name means ‘old one’ and She is a very ancient, possibly pre-Celtic, deity. The Cailleach is the Old Woman, the Hag of Winter. Our modern Halloween witch or hag is a pale representation of Her. She controls the weather and in Scotland is called the Mountain Mother. She is the dark woman of knowledge, ugly but wise. At Samhain, the Crone begins Her rule in the Land of Shadows. She takes the White Rod of Power from Brighid at Samhain. As She takes it in Her hand, it becomes the Black Rod and She begins Her reign as Goddess of the Year of the Little Sun, the dark half of the year.
In Scotland, She is called the Cailleach Bhera (Kal-lay Ver-ah). She holds Brighid prisoner in a cave on top of Ben Nevis while She blasts the Earth with cold and darkness. The Cailleach guards the gateway to the dark half of the year. Wherever She passes the sap fails and withdraws into the roots of the trees. Animals grow sleepy and slow. Those who are so inclined go into hibernation. As for us humans, we begin to slow down also and rest from the frantic activity of summer and harvest. We spend more time indoors engaged in winter pass times and projects.
One of the oldest recorded customs of Samhain, which is no long extant, comes to us from the ancient author, Pliny. He stated that among the Celts sexually active women stained themselves blue with woad and danced naked at Samhain. This is an interesting reference because the Cailleach is blue-black. Is She also painted with woad or did the women stain themselves blue in Her honor?
The Sheela-na-Gig is another Goddess found throughout Celtica and She is a most ancient figure. The symbol of the Sheela-na-gig is the vesica piscis — vessel of the fish. This symbolic representation of the yoni of the Goddess is very ancient. The Christians adopted it to symbolize Christ about two thousand years ago. Nevertheless, for eons it was the symbol of the Goddess. She is depicted as a wizened old woman with a hag’s head, protruding eyes, and a small pointed chin, bearing a striking resemblance to our modern pictures of aliens except that She has the painfully prominent rib cage of a starveling or skeleton. The Sheela-na-Gig is always pictured as squatting and holding open Her yoni in grotesque invitation. She seems to say — ‘You came from my womb into this life and it is into my womb you shall return at the end of it.’ As a Death Goddess, She also presides over Samhain.
In Ireland, Crom Dubh, the Dark Bent One, is the God of Samhain. His face is the dark face of the Dagda. He is bent because He carries the heavy sheaves of the harvest on his back. He is dark because He went into the Earth to find those sheaves. His Faery mistress is Eithne, which means kernel or grain. She is the mother of Lugh. At Samhain She is the new furrow waiting for the seed while the God departs into the Deep Country and She mourns his passing. Ireland’s largest henge, erected around 2500 BCE, has one hundred thirteen megaliths. It is called the Rannach Crom Dubh or the Lios of Crom Dubh.(3) The henge itself is a flat, yellow clay arena surrounded by an embankment. The Lughnasadh and Beltane sunrises are observed through the entrance. The Samhain and Imbolc sunsets rest in a notch in the bank directly opposite the entrance. There is evidence that the annual bull was sacrificed and roasted there during Samhain.(4)
Every year at Samhain, cattle were driven down from the hills and corralled in enclosures such as the Lios.(5) Because the Celts did not make hay, they could not over-winter large numbers of animals. The herds were drastically culled at Samhain. Only the best breeding stock and some dairy cows were retained. Such an abundance of fresh meat meant weeks of feasting. Cattle, and particularly bulls, were sacred in the ancient world. Bulls were sacrificed to the deities. There was also a sort of reverse sacrifice, the vestiges of which survive today in the bull rings of Portugal and Spain and in the streets of Pamplona. We also see this reverse sacrifice in the bull dancer paintings from Crete. Playing with such large powerful animals was, and is, dangerous. There is always a possibility that the bull will win. Was there a ‘running of the bulls’ at the Lios? We shall probably never know but the idea is intriguing.
Samhain is, even to this day, very much associated with death and images of death. In our modern world, especially in the West, we have a horror of death. We spend a great deal of energy pretending that we can overcome physical death. In fact, one may sometimes meet people who actually seem to believe that if they eat just the right foods and do exactly the right exercises they will live forever. These folks are in for a nasty shock sooner or later. Historically, our paranoid fear of death is the exception and not the rule. Queen Elizabeth I, like many of her contemporaries, slept with a skull beside her bed to remind her to live well because one day she would die. Among our ancestors, witnessing death was common. The dead were not hidden away in morgues and mortuaries but laid out in their own homes surrounded by the love of their friends and relatives.
During the season of Samhain Gwynn ap Nudd leads the Wild Hunt, gathering up the souls of all those who died between Beltane and Samhain. In Brittany on La Toussaint or November Eve the Ankou, King of the Dead, and his hosts ride out to collect the souls of those who have died during the year but who have not yet passed into the Shining Country. The peoples of Brittany feel the dead are more numerous and most easily seen at Samhain. Traditionally, we visited graves in this season. Offerings of flowers, food and so forth were left for the dead to enjoy. It was the custom to bury apples for the dead and for the ancestors. This is the time of the year when we acknowledge and honor the dead and seek to communicate with them.
Ancestors are invited to rituals during the Year of the Little Sun. At Samhain, they are also invited to dinner. Even today, we frequently try to contact ancestors or the recently departed. At Samhain, food offerings were made not only to the dead and the ancestors but also to the Tuatha De Danaan and other Faery Folk. If food left out overnight for the ancestors was gone the next morning it was considered a good sign, the ancestors had found the gift acceptable. You may want to honor your ancestors and those who have died in the past with a mute supper. If you have ever seen a little girl playing "tea party" with invisible friends you have observed a supper with the faerys for the Shining Folk gather in hosts around happy children playing at such things.
In Ireland hazel nuts, acorns and apples were offered to the dead. In Brittany at the La Toussaint, the feast was milk curd, crepes and cider served in high style on good white linen. Fiddlers and pipers provided music for the festive occasion. It was believed that the dead came to the table and sometimes they moved chairs or plates about. You may wish to place candles in the window to guide wandering spirits to the light. It was a custom to set candles in windows in vigil for the dead. Just as we keep vigil for them, the ancestors also keep watch over us. The veil between the living and the dead is thinnest at Samhain. That is why at this time we remember our ancestors and all who have gone before us to dwell in the Otherworlds. These ancestors now associate with or are in the process of being transformed into divine beings. At Samhain, the door between the worlds is open.
Ivy, an evergreen symbol of eternity, was placed on graves at Samhain. The first graves in Ireland and the British Isles, long pre-dating the Celts, were Long Barrows. Long Barrows date from c. 4500 BCE and contain chambers shaped like the Great Goddess being both tomb and womb. The doors of the barrows were traditionally left open at Samhain and the doors to the Faery Hills were open in this season. This tradition may have arisen from the fact that it was the custom to place bodies in mortuary urns until the flesh was gone. Then the bones were removed and placed in a burial chamber on Samhain. In addition to being burial mounds, barrows were places of shamanic initiation. At Samhain, the clan totems were renewed. Shamans dressed as their animals and danced them to life. The ancestors were honored with feasts and bonfires. Whole tribes gathered to honor the dead and celebrate life for Samhain was also a time for weddings. You may wish to visit a cemetery on November 1st. Even if no one you know is buried near your home you can take ivy or flowers and food to the grave of a stranger with the intention that your offering of respect will enter the land of the dead in honor of all your ancestors.
The importance of the agricultural cycle to the peoples of a pastoral/agricultural society can hardly be imagined today. Unless one is a farmer, dependent upon nature and the fruits of the land, one has no real point of reference from which to begin to understand our Celtic ancestors emotional ties to their land. The Celts worked in harmony with nature. They co-operated with the Faery energies of the land, which allowed the Shining Ones to operate freely. At every season, certain rituals were performed to maintain the connection between this and otherworlds and to ensure that the subtle energies continued to flow freely. Samhain is third harvest. Everything not harvested by Samhain was left in the fields for the faerys. In Ireland, the Phookas owned any crop not harvested by Samhain Eve. The Phooka has the head of a man but the body of a goat or a horse. They are mischievous faerys, rumored to injure livestock and curdle milk when they are offended. Blackberries and sloes belonged to the faerys after Samhain and no one in Western Ireland or in Cornwall would eat them after November 1st. A tradition found in two such widely removed places possibly indicates that it prevailed throughout Celtica.
(Samhain is excerpted from Portals of the Seasons by Tira Brandon-Evans. Find this book, along with Tira's other books, at: Elder Grove Press)
Tira Brandon-Evans is the Founder and Moderator of the
Society of Celtic Shamans, editor of Earthsongs: Journal of the Society of Celtic Shamans, and is, herself, a Faery Shaman. Her books, The Green and Burning Tree: A Faery Shaman's Handbook, Portals of the Seasons: A Celtic Wheel of the Year, Through the Unremembered Gate: Journeys of Initiation, The Labyrinthine Way: Walking Ancient Paths in a Modern World, and Healing Waters, are all published by Elder Grove Press. She is presently writing a book about the Ogham. You may contact Tira by email at info@faeryshaman.org.
ENDNOTES:
- January 1st was not celebrated as New Year’s Day until the year 1752. Return to Article
- At the time of St. Odilon, the Julian Calendar was in use. This calendar had been calculated by a Greek astronomer and its use instituted by Julius Caesar in 45 BCE. The Julian Calendar was a solar calendar and although it was quite accurate in comparison with previous calendars, it was just over 11 seconds longer than the actual solar year. By 1582, the Vernal or Spring Equinox had slipped backwards 10 days from March 21 to March 11. This meant that the church holidays were not being celebrated on their proper dates. A pope, Gregory XIII instituted another calendar reform. Gregory’s new calendar was not adopted in England until 1752. Eleven days were corrected that point. The day chosen for the correction was September 3 so the day after September 2 was September 14 and thus eleven days were simply eliminated. Some Pagans cling to the Julian Calendar and celebrate Samhain on November 11. Return to Article
- Lios means ring or hill-fort. Return to Article
- Dames, Michael, Mythic Ireland, London, Thames and Hudson, 1992. pp 100-108. Return to Article
- Indeed, when I visited the Lios in May, 2001, cows grazed inside the circle. Return to Article
Samhain excerpted from Portals of the Seasons: A Celtic Wheel of the Year, Copyright © 2001 by Tira Brandon-Evans. Used with permission. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used, copied or reproduced in any way whatsoever, including Internet usage or other electronic means, without permission in writing from Elder Grove Press, except for short quotations for the purposes of review and criticism. Top of Page
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