SAMHAIN

Samhain is the neo-Pagan festival that marks the start of winter, around the beginning of November. In the modern world, it is known as Halloween. Several ancient cultures, such as the Celts, recognised a two-fold division of the year- summer and winter. When the sun is stronger in summer and the days are longer, we have light, warmth and plentiful food as animals produce young, and plants grow. In the winter, the power of the sun declines and we have darkness and cold, vegetation dies back. Nature is in decline; hunger and death may come to many. 

The festival of Samhain is known in Irish as Lá Samhna, in Manx as Sauin and Samhuinn in Scots Gaelic. The Brythonic languages call it the "first of Winter", in Welsh Nos Galen-Gaeaf in Breton Kala-Goañv and in Cornish Kalann Gwav. [i] Samhain is taken from the Old Irish for the festival samfuin from sam "summer" and fuin "sunset/ end". Samhain is still the name for the month of November in modern Irish and Scots Gaelic. The earliest record we have of the name ‘Samhain’ comes from the Coligny Calendar, dated to the 1st century CE, a Celtic lunar calendar. Its year consists of twelve months which are divided into two groups, one headed by the month labelled Samon (Samonios) and the other by the month Giamon (Giamonios) - summer and winter.  The two festivals were polar opposites; Samhain was the beginning of the winter as Beltane was the beginning of the summer. While Beltane marked the season of growth and life, Samhain marked the season of decline and death. The Celts seem to have believed that that there were two suns, the summer and the winter- one strong and hot, the other weak and cool; perhaps even that the appearance of the summer sun in the ordinary world meant the appearance of the winter sun in the underworld and vice versa.

Modern Pagans generally celebrate Samhain on 31^st October or 1^st November. Others calculate the sun’s cross-quarter day, when the sun has reached 15 degrees Scorpio. Others argue that Samhain should be celebrated on the nearest dark moon. However, the real astronomical marker for Samhain is the position of the Pleiades. During November the stars of the Pleiades rise in the east as the sun sets, reach their highest place in the sky - almost directly overhead - at midnight, and then set at sunrise. They can be seen in the sky for nearly the entire night. At Samhain the sun and the Pleiades are in opposition (on opposite sides of us), which happens only once in each Wheel of the Year. The Pleiades pass though the zenith of the heavens quite often, but only through the zenith at midnight on one day each year. Conversely, starting about the middle of May (Beltane Old Style) the sun is aligned between the Earth and the stars of the Pleiades i.e., the Sun is conjunct to the Pleiades, and because of this the cluster is not visible at any time of the night; and it seems to disappear from the sky for a time.

Noting and honouring the position of the Pleiades in the night sky was extremely important for the ancients, and continued to be so in many parts of the world well into the twentieth century. The ancient Greek astronomers Eudoxus of Knidos (c. 403-350 BC) and Aratos of Phainomena (c. 270 BC) referred to them as The Clusterers. Hyginus, in Astronomica (2.21) wrote:

“Our writers call these stars Vergiliae, because they rise after spring. They have still greater honour than the others, too, because their rising is a sign of summer, their setting of winter - a thing is not true of the other constellations."

Many ancient monuments, including some British stone circles, Polynesian temples and the pyramids in Egypt and South America, were aligned to the rising of the Pleiades at October's end. In ancient Greece several temples were lined up with the rising and setting of the Pleiades, including the Parthenon and Hecatompedon for the rising, and the temple of Bacchus in Athens, and the Ascelpieion at Epidaurus and Sunium for their setting. In Mexico the Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacan was orientated to the setting of the Pleiades on the horizon, as were all of the city's westerly running streets. The Pleiades are also believed to be connected to the Great Pyramid of Giza; at times in history they have been perfectly aligned with the southern entrance and their light could be seen within.

The ancients used the heavens as their visible calendar, and we often underestimate the power and importance of star cycles and star myths in the ancient world. The turning stars, the course of the sun and the waxing and waning of the moon were used to plot the passage of time, in days, months, years and greater cycles still, like the fifty-two year cycle of the Pleiades midnight zenith, called a Great Year (every fifty-two years a celebration in Mesoamerica was timed to when the Pleiades were directly overhead at midnight.).

In the Doric era of ancient Greece, the calendar was also regulated by the position of the Pleiades. It had two prime times, at the beginning of May and the beginning of November, relating to the location of the Pleiades. Between May and November it was considered safe to sail, and some think the Greek name of the stars means ‘to sail’. Furthermore, Hippocrates divided the year into four seasons based on the Pleiades and their relationship to the Sun and referred to the “Pleiad-month” that begins “on the day of midnight culmination” - about November 17^th (near Old Style Samhain). Samhain, the Celtic festival of the dead, fell at the midpoint between the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice, and the Celts knew exactly when that was because it took place when the Pleiades culminated at midnight.

Moreover, for some, they signalled not only the Night of the Dead, but the end of the world itself. The energy of this period was considered so powerful and potentially dangerous that it was the time when major cataclysms were reputed to have happened such as the biblical flood or the sinking of Atlantis. For the Aztecs the Pleiades were Tianquiztli: 'Marketplace' or 'Gathering Place', and they linked the date when the constellation reached its highest point at midnight with the end of the world. They believed that every fifty-two years, when their 365-day sun calendar and 260-day ritual calendar came into alignment, the possibility existed that the heavens would cease to move and demons would fall from the sky. However, if the Pleiades reached their zenith at midnight and then continued harmlessly across the sky, all would be well. The Aztec and Maya not only believed that the world would come to an end on one of these Pleiades overhead-at-midnight points, but were convinced that the world had already been destroyed and recreated four times on just such a night. The end of this fifty two year cycle was celebrated with the New Fire ceremony, which involved a human sacrifice. The last recorded New Fire ceremony occurred on November 14^th 1507.

The Pleiades may also represent the Seven Hathors of Egypt, the goddesses who appear at birth and death, and who in this form, are connected with doves, as the Pleiades were in Greek legend. In many mythologies, the dove or some other bird represents the soul after death, and it seems that the Pleiades were intimately connected with the mysteries of death at Samhain, and rebirth at Beltane. It may be that they were thought to guard the gates of the afterlife, opening them at Samhain so that contact with the dead could be made, or even conveying the dead souls into the afterlife during that period. In Northern European Countries there was an All Souls Day tradition of offering prayers for the dead in the direction of the Pleiades, though this was actively suppressed by the Church.

By Samhain, the grain harvest has long been gathered in, the root crops, nuts, berries and apples have been stored against the hungry winter.  Animals were brought down from their summer pastures to more sheltered winter quarters, to be fed on stored hay. Any surplus animals were culled and the meat preserved. Some of the animals would have been ritually sacrificed to propitiate the powers of winter, like the Irish Formorians, gods of blight, and to feed the spirits of the dead that came to visit the Samhain feast.

With the death of vegetation and the decline of the sun, the spirits of winter, decline and death were released from the Otherworld to stalk the land. Good spirits such as the Irish Tuatha Dé Danaan and the English Puck retire from sight until spring returns. Wicked spirits, such as the Scottish Unseelie Court become very active from now until Easter along with cailleachs and hags, the crone goddesses of winter who ruled over the season. Evil omens such as black dogs and the Bean-Nighe or Washer at the Ford also appear. Sidhe mounds open at Samhain and at Hollantide (11^th November- old Samhain) the Hillmen or Hogmen, the most feared of the Manx fairies, move their abode.  After Samhain all the crops left unharvested belong to the sidhe. In Ireland, Halloween is called Phooka Night and after this time he renders all the crops unfit to eat and spoils all the blackberries. Welsh gryphons blight any crops left in the field after Halloween and the Lunatishee will not allow blackthorn to be cut on November 11^th (Old Samhain).

The Otherworld draws close, and it is time to remember and speak to the souls of the dead.  The God dwells in the Underworld as Lord of the Dead and rides out with the Wild Hunt to collect souls.

The stag, the symbol of the Horned God, loses its horns in autumn, echoing the year’s loss of virility and power. In parts of western Brittany the coming of winter is still heralded by the baking of kornigoù (‘little horns’), little cakes in the shape of antlers to commemorate the winter stag.[ii]

The declining sun was encouraged with bonfires. Even into Christian times, villagers cast the bones of the slaughtered cattle upon the flames. Every other fire in the village would be extinguished and re-lit from the central blaze. At the festivals where all torches and lights were extinguished and re-lit from a central bonfire (such as Samhain or Halloween), the brand was called a 'butterfly'. The Celts saw the butterfly as symbol of renewal and rebirth. The Celts suspected that butterflies might be human souls in actuality, and wore butterfly badges as a mark of respect for their ancestral spirits. It was said that the soul of a newly dead person could sometimes be seen hovering over the corpse in the form of a butterfly, and this was a good omen for the fate of the soul.

Doors and winters were left unlocked to allow the dead to enter, and a candle placed in the window to guide them. Foods were set aside for them which were not to be touched by living beings. As late as the nineteenth century in Ireland, blood was scattered at the four corners of the house to protect the dwelling from malign fairies during the winter.

            It is the beginning of the time of chaos that rules until Yule and the return of the sun. The social order is reversed, and guisers play tricks and demand food. Cross-dressing was one of the most widespread and popular ways of expressing the dissolution of the norm. In parts of Wales groups of young men in female garb were referred to as gwrachod (‘hags’) as they wandered through the countryside on Calan Gaeaf, indulging in all kinds of mischief.

According to the monk Bede, there were two seasons in Anglo-Saxon England. He said that summer comprised the six months in which the days are longer than the nights and winter the others. He defined when winter began, at Winterfylleth ("Winter Full Moon", the Saxon name for October) but not summer, which has given rise to much speculation as to whether the year’s division would have run equinox to equinox or May Day to Halloween. The Northern Traditions had a major festival around 15^th October (or possibly at the full moon) called Winter’s Day, marking the start of winter. Like the Celtic Samhain, this festival honoured the dead.  The Anglo-Saxons called November the Blotmonath ‘Blood Month’ or ‘Sacrifice Month’. On November 1, rites for Hela, the Underworld Goddess, raised the dead. The next day, Odin rode his eight-legged horse through the mortal world.

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