Halloween is the one of the oldest and the spookiest holidays still celebrated today. Where you can find a pumpkin patch, corn maze, safe trick-or-treating, hayrides and other stuff ? Yes, only on Halloween day which many people started decorating their homes with some creepy and skoopy style.
What other holiday do you have an excuse to eat all the sugar you want and wear whatever you want? Every kid (and kid at heart) looks forward to October, 31st each year. Little boys magically turn into vampires and little girls into fairies, bidding for the greatest haul of sugar laden sweets and candies.
While millions of people celebrate Halloween without knowing its origins and myths, the history and facts of Halloween make the holiday more fascinating. Some people view Halloween as a time for fun, putting on costumes, trick-or-treating, and having theme parties. Others view it as a time of superstitions, ghosts, goblins and evil spirits that should be avoided at all costs.


The History Halloween
Halloween is on October 31st, the last day of the Celtic calendar. It was originally a pagan holiday, honoring the dead. Halloween was referred to as All Hallows Eve and dates back to over 2000 years ago.
The ancient Celtics called the festival "Samhain" and observed it to celebrate the onset of winter and the beginning of the Celtic New Year. "Samhain" means "end of summer." In Ireland the festival was known as "Samhain", the feast of the Sun. In Scotland, the celebration was known as "Halloween." Samhain marked the third and final harvest, and the storage of food for the winter. It had nothing to do with anything evil, that is a modern day myth perpetuated in films. Samhain was a solar festival marked by sacred fire and fire rituals during the height of the Druids, the priestly caste of the Celtics. All fires except those of the Druids were extinguished on Samhain. All fires were than relit from the town's fire.
The Druid fire was kept burning in the Middle of Ireland, at Usinach. So on the night of October 31, villagers would extinguish the fires in their homes. In Ireland and Scotland, the custom of extinguishing one's home fire and relighting if from the festival bonfire has continued into modern times. They would then dress up in all manner of fancy costumes and parade around the neighborhood. In some parts of modern Scotland, people still celebrate by building bonfires on hilltops and high ground. The fire is known as Halloween bleeze, and custom once included digging a circular trench around the fire to symbolize the sun.

All Souls' Day
All Souls' Day, observed on November 2, is celebrated with Catholic masses and festivities in honor of the dead. The living pray on behalf of Catholics who are in purgatory, the state in the afterlife between the land of the living and the otherworlds where souls are purified before proceeding to heaven. Souls in purgatory, who are members of the church just like living Christians, must suffer so that they can be purged of their sins. Through prayer and good works, living members of the church may help their departed friends and family.
It was on Halloween in 1517 that Martin Luther began to try to reform the Catholic Church. It ended in the formation of the Protestant Church, which didn't believe in saints (in the Roman Catholic sense of of specific individuals).
All Souls' Day has morphed and exists today, particularly in Latin America and Mexico, where All Hallows' Eve, All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day are collectively observed as "Los Dias de los Muertos" (The Days of the Dead). First and foremost, the Days of the Dead is a time when families fondly remember the deceased, visit their graves and clean the gravesites and leave fresh flowers. But it is also a time marked by Mardi Gras-like festivities, including spectacular parades of skeletons and ghouls. In one tradition, a mock funeral procession with a live person inside a coffin is paraded through the streets.


Trick-or-Treating
Some trace the origins of present day "trick-or-treat" to Samhain, which was the supreme night of demonic jubilation. Spirits of the dead would rise out of their graves and wander the countryside, trying to return to the homes where they formerly lived. Frightened villagers tried to appease these wandering spirits by offering them gifts of fruit and nuts. They began the tradition of placing plates of the finest food and bits of treats that the household had to offer on their doorsteps, as gifts, to appease the hunger of the ghostly wanderers. If not placated, villagers feared that the spirits would kill their flocks or destroy their property.
The problem was... if the souls of dead loved ones could return that night, so could anything else,human or not, nice or not-so-nice. The only thing the superstitious people knew to do to protect themselves on such an occasion was to masquerade as one of the demonic hoard, and hopefully blend in unnoticed among them. Wearing masks and other disguises and blackening the face with soot were originally ways of hiding oneself from the spirits of the dead who might be roaming around. This is the origin of Halloween masquerading as devils, imps, ogres, and other demonic creatures.
Others trace "trick-or-treat" to a European custom called "souling". Beggars would go from village to village begging for "soul cakes" made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. At the time, it was believed that the dead remained in limbo for a time after death, and that prayer, even by strangers could guarantee a soul's passage to heaven.
In many parts of Britain and Ireland this night used to be known as 'Mischief Night', which meant that people were free to go around the village playing pranks and getting up to any kind of mischief without fear of being punished. Many of the different customs were taken to the United States by Irish and Scottish immigrants in the nineteenth century, and they developed into 'trick or treat'.