Who first celebrated what we've come to know as Halloween?
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2 Answers
The origins of Halloween can be traced back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain. The Celts, who lived over 2,000 years ago in what is now Ireland, the UK, and parts of Northern France, celebrated their new year on November 1st. They believed that on the night between October 31st and November 1st, the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred and ghosts of the dead returned to earth.
The Celts are believed to be the first people to celebrate what we now know as Halloween. The Celtic festival of Samhain was celebrated on October 31st and marked the end of the harvest season and the beginning of winter. During this festival, people would light bonfires and carve turnips with faces to ward off evil spirits. Later, when the Irish and Scottish immigrants brought this tradition to the United States, they used pumpkins instead of turnips and hung them from their porches as decorations.