Before Pumpkins There Were Turnips: How Ireland Gave the World Halloween
Before the pumpkin came the turnip. Here is how Halloween’s Irish roots, from Samhain to guising, led to the lanterns we carve today.
Long before the supermarket pumpkin display, Irish families were hollowing out turnips by hand to light the way on Halloween night. Many of the customs we associate with the night, from dressing up to carved lanterns, have deep roots in Irish tradition.
Halloween is widely traced back to Samhain (pronounced “sow-in”), an ancient Gaelic festival held around 31 October and 1 November. It marked the end of the harvest and the start of the darker half of the year. Cattle were traditionally brought down from the summer pastures, and communities prepared for the winter ahead.
Samhain was also traditionally seen as a time when the boundary between this world and the next grew thin. Bonfires were lit across the countryside, and they are often said to have been about protection as much as celebration. Later, the Church placed All Saints’ Day on 1 November, and the evening before became known as All Hallows’ Eve, which over time shortened to Halloween.
The dressing up is traditionally explained by that same belief. People are said to have worn costumes and masks so that any wandering spirits would mistake them for one of their own, or leave them alone. This grew into guising, where children went from house to house in disguise and earned their treats with a song, a poem or a joke. Guising was also practised in Scotland, and it is one of the traditions that fed into the trick or treat we know today.
Then there is the turnip. Carved lanterns were traditionally made from turnips, swedes and mangelwurzels, and 19th-century folklore records document the practice in Ireland. Anyone who has tried to scoop out a turnip with a kitchen spoon will know it was no small feat.
The name “jack-o’-lantern” is often linked to the tale of Stingy Jack, a trickster said to wander with a glowing coal inside a hollowed-out turnip. The phrase was also used in older times for the mysterious lights known as will-o’-the-wisp, so the legend is the popular explanation rather than a proven origin.
The pumpkin arrived across the Atlantic. Irish emigrants brought their customs to North America, particularly during the 1800s, and found pumpkins plentiful, larger and far easier to carve. The pumpkin took over, and the custom later returned to Ireland in its new form.
Other Halloween traditions never went away. Barmbrack is still a firm favourite, traditionally baked with items hidden inside, such as a ring said to foretell marriage. Colcannon, snap apple and bobbing for apples also remain part of the night.
So if you are carving a lantern tonight, spare a thought for those who did it the hard way. Whether you go with a pumpkin or a proper Irish turnip, Happy Halloween from all of us at Cork Safety Alerts.
