Halloween Timeline: How the Holiday Has Changed Over the Centuries

Halloween’s origins can be traced back to antiquity. Most point to Samhain, a Celtic festival which commemorated the end of the harvest season and the blurring of the physical and spirit worlds, as Halloween’s forebear. Over the ages, the holiday evolved, taking on Christian influences, European myth and American consumerism. Today, Halloween is celebrated with trick-or-treating, costumes, jack-o-lanterns and scary movies—all things which would likely be unrecognizable to those who took part in the holiday’s earliest forms. 

Ancient Times: Halloween Begins as Samhain 

Ancient Celts, who lived 2,000 years ago in the area that is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France, marked Samhain at the midpoint between the fall equinox and the winter solstice. During this time of year, hearth fires in family homes were left to burn out while the harvest was gathered. After the harvest work was complete, celebrants joined with Druid priests to light massive bonfires and pray. 

Celts believed that the barrier between the physical and spirit worlds was breachable during Samhain. It was expected that ancestors might cross over during this time as well, and Celts would dress as animals and monsters so that fairies were not tempted to kidnap them.

10th Century: Samhain Is Christianized

In the 7th century, the Catholic Church established November 1 as All Saints' Day, a day commemorating all the saints of the church. By the 9th century, the influence of Christianity had spread into Celtic lands, where it gradually blended with and supplanted older Celtic rites. In 1000 A.D., the church made November 2 All Souls’ Day, a day to honor the dead. It’s widely believed today that the church was attempting to replace the Celtic festival of the dead with a related, church-sanctioned holiday.

The All Saints’ Day celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints’ Day) and the night before it, the traditional night of Samhain in the Celtic religion, began to be called All-Hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween. Over many centuries, the three holidays—All Saints’ Day, All Souls' Day and Samhain—essentially merged into one: Halloween. (The Catholic Church still recognizes All Saints’ Day and All Souls' Day today, and some Wiccans and Celtic Reconstructionists commemorate Samhain.) 

The Middles Ages: Trick-or-Treating Emerges

In England and Ireland during All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day celebrations, poor people would visit the houses of wealthier families and receive pastries called soul cakes in exchange for a promise to pray for the souls of the homeowners’ dead relatives. Known as "souling," the practice was later taken up by children, who would go from door to door asking for gifts such as food, money and ale—an early form of trick-or-treating.