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Buffalo, NY

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The ancient Celts that inhabited the British Isles had a fall 'festival' in early November to signal the approach of winter. With shorter days and the oncoming darkness, this
festival took on a cast of darkness and ghoulish behavior. The festival continued after the Romans conquered the area and the Christian religion became prevalent. All Saints Day was celebrated Nov. 1, with its All hallowmass preceded by the 'eve' called Allhalloween. People wore ghoulish costumes, hollowed out fall vegetables, and put lights in them to create scary scenes.
According to folklore, an old miser named Jack tricked the Devil by placing lamps in carved pumpkins. Instead of finding Jack, the Devil was confused by all the faces. Pumpkins with lights inside came to be known as Jack-o-lanterns.


Maybe Alun can confirm this.

Mark

10/24/2001 10:43:52 AM

Webster, NY

As I understand the legend, stingy Jack after tricking the devil that he would never go to "heck" roamed the earth with only a candle to light his way. He originally carved out a turnip and put the candle in it. As time progressed, pumpkins were easier to carve. Check out this link.

http://www.historychannel.com/cgi-bin/frameit.cgi?p=http%3A//www.historychannel.com/exhibits/halloween/pumpkin.html

10/24/2001 2:30:29 PM

Webster, NY

Another site that mentions "Jack" is:

http://www.pumpkinnook.com/facts/jack.htm

10/24/2001 2:34:05 PM

Long Island,New York

Maybe Alun CAN confirm that....but I dont think so. He's old.....but not THAT old.!

10/24/2001 5:03:43 PM

Liverpool , England

Yo guys,
Turnips it was...we never had pumpkins then...and thanks Glenn...I'm not that old..YET. Its not all saints day on 1st November..Its all souls day...the day souls go to heaven..or in some cases downstairs with the horned one..or in my case..I live with the horned one so I will be going upstairs when I pop my clogs.

Alun

10/24/2001 8:44:55 PM

Western Pa.

Alun,

You pop OUR clogs!
LOL,

kilr

10/24/2001 10:17:18 PM

I also heard somewhere that the celts thought if they carved scary faces out of gourds, that they would scare evil spirits away and that's how the jack-o-lantern got started.

10/25/2001 6:02:08 PM