Those who have been poorly received go empty handed and grieving to the grave. Those who have been well received go laden with bananas, tamales, mole and good things. We sit near the altar to keep them company, just as we would if they were alive. Each year we receive our relatives with joy. They don't digest it physically: they extract the goodness from what we provide. What they take is vapor, or steam, from the food. The dead come to eat tamales and to drink hot chocolate.
If you should see a fly on the rim of a cup, don't frighten it away - it is a dead relative who has returned. This includes dogs, cats, even flies or mosquitoes. Younger people are less concerned, but there is one rule we must obey: while the festival lasts, we treat all living beings with kindness. My grandmother was constantly worried, and forever checking that the door had not been shut. Golden paths of marigold petals are strewn from the altar to the street (sometimes all the way to the cemetary) to help the confused souls of the dead find their way back home.Īccording to Fredy Mendez, a Totonac man from Veracruz: "Between 31 October and 2 November, past generations were careful always to leave the front door open, so that the souls of the deceased could enter. Food, drink, clothes, tequila, cigarettes, chocolates and children's toys are set out for departed loved ones, surrounded by candles, flowers, palm leaves, tissue paper banners, and the smoke of copal incense. Within the house, an ofrenda or offering is painstakingly assembled on a lavishly decorated altar. The holiday varies from region to region but generally take place over the days of October 31st, November 1st, and November 2nd, celebrated with graveyard gatherings and Carnival-like processions in the streets. In Mexico, a similar tradition was born from a mix of indigenous folk beliefs and medieval Spanish Catholism, resulting in los Dias de Muertos (the Days of the Dead) - a holiday still widely observed across Mexico and parts of the American South-West. In Egypt, Osiris (god of the Netherworld, death, and resurrection) was drowned in the Nile by his brother Seth on the 17th of Athyr (November) each year on this night dead spirits were permitted to return to their homes, guided by the lamps of living relatives and honored by feasts. In later centuries, Halloween turned into a night of revels for witches and gouls, eventually tamed into the modern holiday of costumes, tricks and treats.Īlthough the prospect of traffic between the living and the dead has often been feared, some cultures celebrated those special times when doors to the Underworld stood open. In ancient times, hearth fires were smothered while bonfires blazed upon the hills, surrounded by circular trenches to protect all mortals from the faery host and the wandering spirits of the dead.
In Celtic lore, October 31st is Samhain (All Hallow's Eve, or Halloween): the night when Arawn, lord of the Dead, rides the hills with his ghostly white hounds, and the Faery Court rides forth in stately procession across the land.
0 kommentar(er)
