The feast of Samhain takes place at Halloween. In the time of the Celts about 6000 years ago this great feast was once the biggest sacred day of the whole year in Ireland.

The Celts divided the year into two seasons: the season of light beginning at Beltane on May 1st and the season of darkness called Samhain beginning on November 1st.

The Celts believed that in the darkness and silence came the new beginning, the stirring of the seeds below the ground. The most magic time of this festival is November Eve, the night of October 31st, known today of course, as Halloween. In Ireland today Halloween is still known as Oíche Shamhna

When St Patrick came and Ireland became Christian 1500 years ago, Samhain was changed to Hallowmas, or All Saints' Day. The early Catholics remember the souls of the people who died during the year and who had gone to Heaven.

The night before Samhain became popularly known as Halloween, All Hallows Eve, or Hollantide. November 2nd became All Souls Day, This is when prayers were to be offered for the souls of all who had departed and those who were waiting in Purgatory for entry into Heaven.This is still the way today.

In the country in Ireland, Samhain was the first day of winter, when the farmers led the cattle and sheep down from their summer hillside pastures to the shelter of stable and byre.

The hay that would feed them during the winter was stored in sturdy thatched ricks, tied down securely against storms. All the harvest was gathered in -- barley, oats, wheat, turnips, and apples -- for come November, the faeries would blast every growing plant with their breath, blighting any nuts and berries remaining on the hedgerows.

Peat and wood for winter fires were stacked high by the fireside. It was a great happy time of family reunion, when all members of the household worked together baking, salting meat, and making preserves for the winter feasts to come.

The endless days of summer gave way to a warm, dim and often smoky room; the noises of summer were replaced by the sound of voices inside safe from the winter snows, young and old, human and animal.

In early Ireland, people gathered together at Samhain to celebrate the feast. The greatest assembly was the 'Feast of Tara,' at the home of the High King as it was the heart of the sacred land,the place where the new year began.

In every household throughout the country, hearth-fires were extinguished. All waited for the Druids to light the new fire of the New Year. We still light bonfires today. They are a sign of new dreams and new beginnings.

Young people and servants long ago lit sticks from the fire and ran around the fields and hedges of the house and farm, while community leaders surrounded parish boundaries with a magic circle of light. The bonfire gave the countryside light in the winter darkness, keeping away cold, discomfort, and evil spirits Afterwards, ashes from the fires were sprinkled over the fields to protect them during the winter months

Apple Magic
The Celts believed that at the heart of Celtic Heaven grows an apple tree whose fruit has magical properties.
The Celts believed that this wonderful world where no one ever grew old lay across the western sea .Old sagas tell of heroes crossing the western sea to find this wondrous country, known in Ireland as Emhain Abhlach, and in Britain, Avalon. At Samhain, the apple harvest is in, and old fireside games, such as apple-bobbing, remind us of the journey across water to obtain the magic apple.