Oct 2023
Does your family celebrate halloween? Please send in your family traditions and halloween photos to our online form https://forms.office.com/e/8AGp9fS99n We will choose a winning photograph before the next Ardmag edition for a prize
BONFIRES The community would gather together and light huge fires to ward off bad fortune for the coming year and any evil spirits. Jack-o-lanterns In order to carry home an ember from the communal bonfire, the people would hollow out a turnip so they could walk home with the fire still burning. The switch from the turnip to pumpkin happened soon after the great potato famine of the 1800s. It caused a mass migration of Irish people to settle in the USA. It was concluded that pumpkins were a lot easier to carve, and so the famous jack-o-lantern was born. Costumes The community dressed in animal skins and heads, if spirits happened to be wandering the earth and bumped into one of the Celts they might think they were spirits themselves, and let them go free. Barmbrack From the Irish name “Bairín Breac,” this is a traditional Irish Halloween cake which essentially a sweet bread with fruit through it as well as some other treats. Often a ring would be hidden for someone to find. Apple Halloween games Bobbing for apples in a basin of water or hanging an apple from a string. The apples are associated with love and fertility.
Thank you to Magali Szalay for sending in pictures of the Ardmac office in Belgium!!
37
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online