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It is late on Hallowe'en night, and the trick-or-treaters have finally blown out the candles and packed up the costumes and sweets (undoubtedly settling in for an annual bout of disturbing post-sugarplum visions).
Now that the evening has at last grown quiet, there is time to tell tales,to reflect upon some of the holiday's mythical and traditional resonances, and to pay our respects to the spirits. In Irish mythology, Samhain, or Hallowe'en marks the anniversary of the fall of the Formorians, a horde of terrible, brutish giants, to the Tuatha de Danaan, the first people of Ireland, and ancestors of the Irish faeries, or Sidhe folk. The faerie folk of the Celtic nations are very active on Halloween night, and appear in a number of legends relating directly to the holiday. Celtic mythology emphasizes the magical importance of boundary-times and -places, such as twilight, dawn, the full or new moon, the seashore and the outer bounds of forests. Samhain, the last of summer's three harvest festivals, represents the beginning of a new year in the Celtic tradition, as well as the end of summer. Along with its sister holiday, Beltaine, or May Day, which represents the end of winter, it represents one of the most important boundary-times on the Celtic calendar. It is during this time that the walls or veils between world are believed to be the thinnest, making communication between the spirits of the dead and the faerie folk and mortals more likely. Modern popular culture has styled ghosts and faeries as two very different types of mythological creatures. However, in many European traditions, the distinction between nature spirts or spirit sof place and those of the dead is less defined. This is especially true in Ireland, where the faerie folk are associated with ancestral spirits, and said to build majestic halls beneath the hills of the countryside. When Johnson characterizes Oberon, the king of faerie in the British and French literary traditions, as "the king of ghosts and shadows", he is tapping into a long tradition of drawing parallels between the Celtic faerie kings and the lord of Hades in Greek and Roman tradition. Many Irish and Scottish folk tales in which a visitor to the faerie realm are compelled to stay after tasting forbidden food are similar in structure to the tale of Persephone, a Greco-Roman tale which is also intimately associated with the Samhain season. In Tam Lin (Child #39), one of the most popular of the Scottish ballads collected by folkorist Francis James Child, a young man enslaved by the Faerie Queen is rescued by his lover on Halloween night, the one night of the year throughout which the faeries of the Wild Hunt are visible to mortal eyes. It is of particular significance that Tam Lin's lady meets him at a crossroads, yet another boundary-place.
The copyright of the article Samhain Faerie Tales in Monster Legends is owned by . Permission to republish Samhain Faerie Tales in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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