HALLOWEEN
HISTORY
Halloween
(also spelled Hallowe'en) is an annual holiday celebrated on October
31. It has roots in the Celtic festival of Samhain and the Christian
holy day of All Saints.
Originally Halloween was a pagan festival, around the idea of linking the living with the dead, when contact became possible between the spirits and the physical world, and magical things were more likely to happen. Like most pagan festivals, long ago it was absorbed into the festivals of the expanding Christian church, and became associated with All Hallows Day, or All Saints Day, which eventually fell on November 1.
The celebration of Halloween survived most strongly in Ireland. It was an end of summer festival, and was often celebrated in each community with a bonfire to ward off the evil spirits. Children would go from door to door in disguise as creatures from the underworld to collect treats, mainly fruit, nuts and the like for the festivities. These were used for playing traditional games like eating an apple on a string or bobbing for apples and other gifts in a basin of water, without using your hands. Salt might be sprinkled on the visiting children to ward off evil spirits. Carving turnips as ghoulish faces to hold candles became a popular part of the festival, which has been adapted to carving pumpkins in America.
The day is often associated with the colours black and orange, and is strongly associated with symbols like the jack-o'-lantern. Halloween activities include trick-or-treating, wearing costumes and attending costume parties, ghost tours, bonfires, visiting haunted attractions, telling scary stories, and watching horror films!
Originally Halloween was a pagan festival, around the idea of linking the living with the dead, when contact became possible between the spirits and the physical world, and magical things were more likely to happen. Like most pagan festivals, long ago it was absorbed into the festivals of the expanding Christian church, and became associated with All Hallows Day, or All Saints Day, which eventually fell on November 1.
The celebration of Halloween survived most strongly in Ireland. It was an end of summer festival, and was often celebrated in each community with a bonfire to ward off the evil spirits. Children would go from door to door in disguise as creatures from the underworld to collect treats, mainly fruit, nuts and the like for the festivities. These were used for playing traditional games like eating an apple on a string or bobbing for apples and other gifts in a basin of water, without using your hands. Salt might be sprinkled on the visiting children to ward off evil spirits. Carving turnips as ghoulish faces to hold candles became a popular part of the festival, which has been adapted to carving pumpkins in America.
The day is often associated with the colours black and orange, and is strongly associated with symbols like the jack-o'-lantern. Halloween activities include trick-or-treating, wearing costumes and attending costume parties, ghost tours, bonfires, visiting haunted attractions, telling scary stories, and watching horror films!
When
and where is it celebrated?
Halloween
is celebrated on 31st
of October . Where celebreted in America, Canada, USA and UK.
Why
is it celebrated on the 31st October?
Because is the day of All Saints.
Is
it a religious celebration?
Yes,
it is.
What does
the word 'Halloween' mean?
The
words mean: All Hallows even
Name
2 typical games.
Bobbing and apple and carving pumpkins.
How
do people celebrate it today?
Halloween
activities include trick-or-treating, wearing costumes and attending
costume parties, ghost tours, bonfires, visiting haunted attractions,
telling scary stories, and watching horror films.
SLEEPY
HOLLOW
PLOT
Ichabod
Crane is a 24-year-old New York City police officer in 1799. Facing
imprisonment for going against traditional methods and favoring
forensic investigation techniques such as finger-printing and
autopsies not considered to be orthodox at that time and
considered unimportant, Ichabod submits to deployment with his bag of
tools to the Westchester County hamlet of Sleepy Hollow, New York,
which has been plagued by a series of brutal slayings in which the
victims have been found decapitated: Peter Van Garrett, wealthy
farmer and landowner; his son Dirk; and the widow Emily Winship, who
secretly wed Van Garrett and was pregnant before being murdered.
Arriving in Sleepy Hollow, Crane is informed by the town's elders
that the killer is not of flesh and blood, but rather an undead
headless Hessian mercenary from the American Revolution War who
rides at night on a massive black steed in search of his missing
head.
Crane
begins his investigation, remaining highly skeptical about the
supernatural elements in the case until he actually encounters
the Headless
Horseman himself,
who kills the Magistrate Samuel Phillipse on sight. Boarding in a
room at the home of the town's richest family and the Van Garretts'
next of kin, the Van Tassels, Crane develops an attraction to their
daughter Katrina (an attraction deeply resented by Brom van Brunt, a
suitor to Katrina), while he is plagued by nightmares of his mother's
horrific torture when he was a child. Brom attempts to frighten Crane
away by posing as the Headless Horseman, but is himself killed by the
real Horseman. Riding into the Western Woods with the orphaned Young
Masbath, son of the Horseman's fifth victim, they come across the
cave dwelling of a reclusive sorceress. She reveals the location of
the gnarled Tree of the Dead, which marks the Horseman's grave, as
well as his portal into the natural world from the supernatural.
Crane
discovers that the ground is freshly disturbed and, digging through,
discovers the Horseman's skeleton and that the skull is missing; just
then, the Horseman's ghost bursts out of the tree and gallops towards
Sleepy Hollow. Crane attempts to follow but winds up lost. The
Killian family are taken by the Horseman because of the threat the
midwife poses to Lady Van Tassel's secret and a town council is held
in the town church. The Horseman seemingly kills Lady Van Tassel and
heads off to the church to get Katrina's father Baltus, with the
townspeople filing in just as the horseman arrives. With the men
firing muskets at the Horseman as he circles the church, Crane
realizes the Horseman can't enter the church grounds due to some
protective supernatural force. A massive fight breaks out in the
church when Dr. Thomas Lancaster suggests confessing for forgiveness,
and then Lancaster is killed by Reverend Steenwyck, who is in turn
shot by a frightened Baltus. The chaos ends only when the Horseman
harpoons Baltus through a church window using a pointed church fence
post attached to a rope, dragging him out and acquiring his head.
Crane
becomes suspicious when the corpse of the maidservant has too fresh a
wound on her palm for one already dead. His suspicions are confirmed
to be right when the Lady van Tassel emerges, alive, from the dark
and shocks her step-daughter Katrina into a faint.
Katrina
awakens and eventually uncovers a murky plot revolving around revenge
on the Van Garretts and land rights with the Horseman controlled by
Katrina's stepmother Lady Van Tassel, who sends the supernatural
killer after Katrina now to solidify her hold on what she considers
her property, a piece of land unjustly claimed by Baltus.
Following
a fight in the local windmill and a stagecoach chase through the
woods, Crane eventually thwarts Lady Van Tassel by throwing the skull
to the Horseman, breaking the curse. The Horseman, no longer under
Lady Van Tassel's control, hoists her up on his horse, then rides to
Hell taking her with him, fulfilling her end of the deal with the Devil.
With the Headless Horseman menace eradicated, Crane returns home to
New York with Katrina and young Masbath, just in time
forChristmas and
the new century.
MY
OPINION
I
liked this movie because it was not only scary, but also points was
funny. I think the argument is well thought out and the characters
too. This fully recommend the film to those who enjoy the Halloween
sitting on the sofa with some popcorn and watch a good horror film!
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
