Top ten spooky Irish traditions for Halloween – PHOTOS

Traditions to make your Halloween just that little bit more Irish

CATHY HAYES,

IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Tuesday, October 25, 2011, 7:42 AM

Updated Tuesday, October 25, 2011, 10:10 AM

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Jack o' Lantern - an ancient invention to ward off evil spirits this Halloween

Photo by Jack Reznicki/CORBIS

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Costumes

The community would gather around the bonfire and may would be dressed up in elaborate animal skins and heads.

The idea was that the evil spirits would be scared off by the fires. Then if the spirits happened to be wandering the earth and bumped into one of the Celts they might they were spirits themselves, because of their disguises, and let them go free. This is where our tradition of dressing up comes from.

Trick or Treat

Trick or treat originated centuries ago. In Ireland the poor would go from door to door at rich peoples homes and ask for food, kindling or money. They would then use what they collected for their celebrations on Halloween.

PHOTOS - Top Irish Halloween traditions slideshow

Colcannon

(Pronounced kohl cannon)

This is the traditional dinner to have on Halloween night before you head out for an evening of fun and mischief. It is a simple dish made with boiled potatoes, curly kale (a type of cabbage) and raw onions.

Traditionally coins were wrapped in pieces of cleans paper and slipped into children’s colcannon for them to find and keep. Sometimes people also hide a ring in the colcannon. Whoever finds the ring will be married within the year.

Recipe
Serves 4

Ingredients:
3-4 medium potatoes, peeled and quartered
3 tbsp. milk or unsweetened/plain soy milk
1/4 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
2 cups chopped cabbage or kale
2 tbsp. butter or margarine
1/4 cup chopped onions or green onions

Method:

Cook potatoes in a pot of boiling water until tender. Drain, reserving water.
Place the hot potatoes in a large bowl.
Add chopped cabbage to the reserved potato water. Cook 6-8 minutes or until tender.
Meanwhile, fry the onions in the butter or margarine.
When they are cool enough to handle, mash potates with a hand masher or fork. Add the fried onions and cabbage.
Add milk, salt and pepper and beat until fluffy.
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8 Comments

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Saoirse9 | Oct 26, 2011, 05:58 PM EDT

Clearly, as many of these are pagan traditions, they go back much further than 1,000 bloody A.D.! WHo's the eejit that came up with this date? The author?

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ellenfromcork | Oct 25, 2011, 07:07 PM EDT

SOY MILK in colcannon!!?? Sweet mother of Jesus, who thought that one up?

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larrydalamb | Oct 25, 2011, 06:20 PM EDT

"It was said that if you drop a cutting of your hair into the embers of the fire the identity of your first husband would be revealed." Expecting more than one?

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zekeking | Oct 25, 2011, 05:27 PM EDT

Please forgive my ignorance but is putting prizes in the barnbrack the precursor to our wedding cakes with charms in them attached to ribbons? Thimbles for old maids, rings for the next married? Never got the thimble, but sometimes wished I had...haha

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GeorgeDillon | Oct 25, 2011, 02:47 PM EDT

Good article, and some interesting posts. But the sad fact is that the Irish, more particularly the young Irish, are totally cut off from all the traditions of Halloween. It's nonsense to talk of "top ten Irish Halloween customs". They don't exist. In fact, I happened to be in Ireland at Halloween some years back. I was disappointed that NOT ONE young Irish person I spoke to knew that Halloween has deep Irish roots. The fact is that the Irish are rapidly losing their culture. It's a complex phenomenon, caused by globalization, English language, Mass Immigration of foreigners, poor education etc. But its' happening, and accelerating. Any American who has traveled in Ireland will have found that the Irish are utterly ignorant of what their grandparents knew of the country's lore. The culture of the Irish is now as dead as the culture of the ancient Egyptians or Aztecs. The result is that the modern Irish are quite boring people, dull and bland.

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thesavageirish | Oct 25, 2011, 12:47 PM EDT

Never ceases to amaze that in a country whose architectural heritage goes back 5000 years, an extensive astrologically tied tradition manifest in a timekeeper such as Newgrange older than the pyramids and an extensive folkloric tradition reaching back to times biblical that irish tradition is nonexistent until the arrival of Rome. Samhain, or old irish samain is cognate with assembly which in the annals would indicate a royal assembly at the end of the harvest. The 'Cath Maige Tuireadh' or Battle of Mag Tuireadh takes place on Samhain where the old deities Morrigan and Dagda make love before the battle. Have the heroics of young Fionn MacCumhail against the burner Aillen on the night of samhain have been magically transposed to the tenth century also? For the love of god give us our due and understand that the celtic language is older than Latin.

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Ballyphehane1 | Oct 25, 2011, 11:22 AM EDT

In the Barmbracks in Cork, we never had a thimble. We had a Pea - that meant you wouldn't get married. There was also a stick - supposed to symbolize an unhappy marriage (referred to when we were young as - your husband/wife will beat you). For games then, we had the usual snap apple and bobbing for apples. We had something similar to the friar one you mentioned but it was a plate with mound of flour and a cherry on top. You take turns slicing a section of the mound of flour to the side until the cherry falls. The person who makes the cherry fall then gets their head pushed into the plate of flour. We also did races with monkey nuts on the ground - you had to move the monkey nut with your nose. Great fun!!

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davidgavan | Oct 25, 2011, 10:51 AM EDT

Reminded me of my father who as a young lad in Dublin, circa 1910, would tie a rope across the narrow streets to opposing door knobs and then knock on both doors. Kind of a harmless trick by today,s standards

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