In Witchcraft in England 1558-1618 (edited by Barbara Rosen, University of Massachusetts Press, 1969) a pamphlet reporting “A Strange Report of Six Most Notorious Witches, who by their devilish practices murdered above the number of foure hundred small children, besides the great hurtes  they  committed upon divers other people……..in Germanie” ,  printed in London in 1601, was typical of the fear-oriented 17^th century English and European mindset. 

The origins of All Hallow’s Eve can be traced back to the pagan Celtic festival of Samhain, which largely through the efforts of Christian missionaries beginning early in the seventh century began to take on a character more in keeping with the Catholic faith, although never quite to the missionaries’ satisfaction.  While Nov. 1^st became All Saints Day in honor of every Christian saint, the night before became, in essence, the otherworld’s Big Night Out, a surviving vestige of that earlier paganism.

The missionaries’ aim was to incorporate, rather than obliterate, pagan practices that dated back to time out of mind.

“The old beliefs associated with Samhain never died out entirely,” observed Jack Santino of the Library of Congress’ American Folklife Center. “The powerful symbolism of the traveling dead was too strong, and perhaps too basic to the human psyche, to be satisfied with the new, more abstract Catholic feast honoring saints. “

Santino noted that as time passed, it became customary for people to dress up as these returning dead souls and strange creatures, and perform various antics in return for food and drink. Such activity was called “mumming” and retains that name in some parts of the English-speaking world.     

“Halloween also retains some features that harken back to the original harvest holiday of Samhain, such as the customs of bobbing for apples and carving vegetables, as well as the fruits, nuts, and spiced cider associated with the day,” said Santino.

It’s difficult to escape the conclusion that neither fear nor fun were invented in our 21^st century.