Halloween vs. Groundhog\'s Day Essay for comp II PDF

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Halloween vs. Groundhog's Day Essay for comp II...

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Professor Capodicasa English 1102-R35 November 9, 2017 The Changing of Seasons - Revision Halloween is celebrated on October 31 annually and has become a day of costumes, candy treats, and discounts at Chipotle. However, Halloween originated from a more serious Celtic holiday called Samhain. Samhain was the day the Celtic people recognized as the end of their harvesting season and the beginning of winter. In essence, the Celtics celebrated Samhain as New Year’s Eve since they believed that the new year began on November 1 (Santino). They also believed that that was the time of the year when the dead could be in contact the living. This was because the Celtics associated paranormal activity with the days getting shorter and colder (“History of Halloween”). Due to this held belief, the Celtics would often light bonfires and wear elaborate costumes made of animal skins to ward off the possibly malicious spirits that they thought ruined their crops and caused chaos. In the eighth century Pope Gregory III altered the history of Halloween by declaring November 1 as All Saint’s Day to honor priests, saints, and martyrs. He then declared October 31 to be All Hallow’s Eve -- the celebrations of which incorporated a lot of the Celtic traditions during Samhain (Santino). Around the 1900s, people from Ireland and Scotland brought over the traditions and holiday of All Hallow’s Eve to America, which later became Halloween as it is celebrated today. It is unclear how, but the holiday became hugely commercialized by the immigrants and the child-friendly day full of candy, costumes, and “trick-or-treating” (“Halloween in the United States”). While Halloween is celebrated in the fall, Groundhog’s Day is celebrated in the winter. On February 2 of each year, a groundhog is treated as a meteorologist since the belief is that if

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the rodent sees his own shadow on the ground, the United States will have to suffer through another six weeks of winter. If the groundhog does not view his own shadow, then it is believed that spring will be just around the corner. This tradition was celebrated for the first time in Gobbler’s Knob in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania on February 2, 1877. The tradition evolved from the Christian traditions of Candlemas Day where a priest would bless and then distribute candles to everyone for the winter. The number of candles distributed signified how long the winter would last. Later, the Germans altered this tradition slightly and began using hedgehogs to predict the duration of the winter season. While the Germans emigrated to the United States, they began using groundhogs to predict the length of the winter season since male groundhogs come out of their burrows to mate in February. Today, Phil the groundhog from Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania is recognized as America’s true weather predicting animal (“First Groundhog Day”). Halloween and Groundhog’s Day may seem to be completely different and unrelated holidays at the surface level, but they can be seen as being similar since both signify the changing of seasons. Halloween signifies the coming of winter based on its Celtic and Pagan roots while Groundhog’s Day is celebrated to determine if the winter season will transition into spring based on its Germanic and Christian roots. Besides marking the transitions from one season to the next, the two holidays also utilize the belief that animals hold certain, almost “magical” abilities. For example, the Celtics believed that wearing animal skins would ward off the evil spirits due to the ferocity and abilities of said animals while the Germans believed that hedgehogs and groundhogs possessed the ability to accurately predict the weather. Where the two holidays differ completely is that Samhain, which later became Halloween, dealt with the coming of sinister things such as the cold, darkness, and evil spirits while Groundhog’s Day

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deals with the hope that cold and dark period will end and a more pleasant and warm time will come soon. Overall, if one digs deep enough, he or she will find the significant ties of these seemingly silly holidays to the changing of the seasons and what the change or transition truly signifies. Word Count: 668

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Works Cited “Halloween in the United States.” Timeanddate.com, Timeanddate.com, www.timeanddate.com/holidays/us/halloween. History.com Staff. “First Groundhog Day.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, www.history.com/this-day-in-history/first-groundhog-day. History.com Staff. “History of Halloween.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2009, www.history.com/topics/halloween/history-of-halloween. Santino, Jack. “Halloween.” Halloween: The Fantasy and Folklore of All Hallows (The American Folklife Center, Library of Congress), The Library of Congress, 1 Sept. 1982, www.loc.gov/folklife/halloween.html....