An Ancient History of Halloween

"Halloween dates all the way back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain 2,000 years ago in what is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and Northern France. They celebrated New Year in November on the 1st. it marked the end of summer and harvesting and the beginning of the dark, cold winter, a time of year that was often associated with death. Celts believed that on the night before the New Year, the boundary between the living and the dead became blurred. On the night of October 31, they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. They caused trouble and damaged crops, Celts also thought that the presence of the spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future. The people depended on the spirit world for these predictions; they were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter.

To celebrate the event, they would build bonfires and gather around them. During the celebration, the Celts wore costumes, mainly consisting of animal heads and skins, and attempted to tell each other their fortunes.

By 43 A.D., Romans had conquered the most of the Celtic territory. For over four hundred years that they ruled the Celtic lands, two of the roman festivals were combined with the traditional Celtic celebration of Samhain. The first was Feralia, a day in late October when the Romans remembered the passing of the dead. The second was a day to honor Pomona, the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona is the apple and the incorporation of this celebration into Samhain probably explains the tradition of "bobbing" for apples that is sometimes done today on Halloween.

By the 800s, the influence of the Christians had spread into the Celtic’s lands. In the 7th century, Pope Boniface IV designated November 1 as All Saints' Day, a time to honor saints and martyrs. It is widely believed today that the pope was attempting to replace the Celtic festival of the dead, with a church-sanctioned holiday. The celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas and the night before it, the night of Samhain, began to be called All-hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween. Even later, in 1000 A.D., the church would make November 2 All Souls' Day, a day to honor the dead. It was celebrated similarly to Samhain, with big bonfires, parades, and dressing up in costumes as saints, angels, and devils. Together, the three celebrations, the eve of All Saints', All Saints', and All Souls', were called Hallowmas."

So, I was watching the history channel, like I always do, and I saw this little advertizement in the bottom right hand corner that said to go to history.com to watch history about halloween. I got the idea to watch it, take notes, and make it my blog. To watch it yourself click here or here.

World News

A recent news story that I found interesting was Hillary Clinton’s talk at a Russian college. Earlier this week, she met and talked with the president about arms control, Afghanistan, and Iran and its nuclear weapons. That resulted in nothing, the president agreed to nothing. This conclusion makes me ask why. I want to know a reason why Russia doesn’t care about terrorism, or is it that they just don’t care for the United States. I agree with Hillary in thinking that it is because they sill have resentment toward the U.S. because of the cold war. This is bad sportsmanship in my mind. Forgive and forget is what I think they should have done. If it is the other way around and they really don’t care about the terrorists, then they need to wake up, because they don’t just have one target, the whole world is there target.

So, obviously not liking this, Hillary gave a speech to next generation Russians, college kids. She talked to them about their country’s grudge against the U.S. and how we should get over it, let the past be the past and move on to the future. I think that this is a good idea. If only we could all get along, but that is really not an option, since the human race is violent by nature. I hope that these young people can learn to do the right thing, which is to stick up for what they believe in, if they don’t hold grudges, and stick up for weapon control if you believe in weapon control.

I think that terrorism is a huge issue; I also think that if all the countries who want to bring it down ban together we can stop it. We could put an end to some people’s constant fear that an attack will happen near them or to someone near them or that they will somehow create nuclear weapons and become even more dangerous. If we put an end to all threats, maybe we can start anew, all be allies and get along, just like I have always wanted. Hillary also thinks that it is wrong or Russia to turn us down because of a past grudge toward the United States.

So, after reading this article, I still have a question that is unanswered. I would like to know if terrorists are at all threatening to Russia and it they are, why not try to put a stop to them?

Four hundred words about nothing, anything, and everything

After school last Friday, I was in deep thought on what to write four hundred words about. At first I decided on writing about dance. At the moment, it sounded like a good topic, but once I actually started writing about it I realized that I already had too much written about myself on my blog, even though the blog is supposed to be mine and about me, it just seemed like I spent too much time writing about me, also, I thought, who cares?, because really who does care how long I have been doing ballet or what grade of cecchetti I’m in?

My next idea was to write about my family. After about five minutes, I realized that there is really no way I could squeeze four hundred words out of I have parents, a sister, a brother, and a dog. I decided that that idea was not a good one. If you are going to write something, you want it to be worth reading, and so far, I have not come up with that read-worthy idea. So again, I thought about what I should write about.

Then, I thought I had it, the golden idea, the read-worthy one, it was about summer. I thought long and hard then about what I did over the summer and came up with practically nothing. So, for the third consecutive time, it was back to the drawing board.

My next idea was not one that I was very proud of, but it was an idea. I was going to write about my favorite subject in school, history. I would write about how me and my love for history go back to when I was about four years old. I thought about how to write this in a way that wouldn’t put people to sleep, but that was not an option. Anyway I would have written that would have been exceedingly boring to practically anyone who doesn’t love learning about history, or me. Once again I brought up to myself the fact that nobody really cares. Ugh, I thought. I was out of ideas.

For the next few days, I would be in almost constant thought on what to write four hundred words about. It was pain-staking, until I finally came up with it, the real winner, the one you have just read. I wrote about writing the four hundred word page.