Mysterious
rites aimed at foretelling the future were popular at
Hallowe'en . One custom was to get each member of the
family to put an ivy leaf without spot or stain into a
glass of water overnight.
In
the morning, if the leaf is still spotless, the person
is assured of life for another 12 months but if the leaf
has any spots on it, the person who put it in water will
surely die within the year.
Another
custom in the Mourne mountains was to fill a thimble full of
salt and turn it upside down on a plate. Stacks of salt were
made for each person in the house and if the next morning, your
stack of salt had collapsed - you've guessed it - you were not
expected to live for another year.
A marriage divination practiced at Hallowe'en was to drop nail
and hair cuttings into the last embers of the fire as a powerful
charm to induce a dream of a future spouse.
Samhain
was a fire festival and Hallowe'en celebrations in Ireland now
usually involve lighting a bonfire but this is not to be confused
with the Guy Fawkes bonfire tradition in Britain . On November
5, effigies of scheming Fawkes who planned to blow up the British
Parliament with gunpowder are set on fire around the country
to roars of 'Let 'im fry'.
In Ireland, Oiche Shamhna is as popular as Christmas and birthdays
in some houses and children affectionately call it puca night
and in parts of counties Cork and Limerick , it is known as
snap apple night.
Crab apples
are suspended at the end of a long string from the ceiling and
with hands ties behind their backs, youngsters chase the swinging
apple with their open mouths and the first one to get a grip
of it with their teeth is the winner. A variation of snap apple
is ducking for apples in a basin of water.
The
fruity barnbrack (bairin breac in gaelic) concealed a range
of tokens ….a ring means marriage, the button suggests bachelorhood
and the thimble means spinsterhood for the superstititous diner.
Even the poorest families would have something special for dinner
on October 31 . Similar to other festivals, better off neighbours
would make presents of milk, butter and other basic foodstuffs.
Hallowe'en was a favourite time for eating Stampy cakes made
from a blend of grated raw potato and flour flavoured with sugar,
carawayseeds and cream and another variation was boxty, made
with mashed potato.
While popular in the U.S., pumpkins are a new addition to the
Hallowe'en party scene in Ireland .They are used widely like
turnips as Jack O'Lanterns, filled with candles but the contents
of the squash scooped out are rarely used to make pumpkin pies,
a little known delicacy in Ireland.
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