Category: Halloween

Corn Mazes—A corn maze is a type of HALLOWEEN ATTRACTION, although corn mazes aren’t always exclusively tied to Halloween— they may simply be a form…

Corn Dolly—A HARVEST custom with certain specific Halloween variants. Typically a corn dolly was a semi-human figure made from the last sheafs of CORN (or…

Corn —Associated with Halloween because corn (which usually refers to OATS outside of America) ripens in late October. Corn husking contests were popular at nineteenth-century…

Colum Kill— Another name for St. Columba, an Irish priest who in the sixth century had been ordered to convert the Picts in Ireland. St.…

Coel Coeth (also Coel Certh)—Welsh name for the BONFIRE each family built in the most prominent place near the house on November Eve. Part of…

Clowns— Clowns have been popular Halloween figures ever since COSTUMING began to figure prominently in the holiday’s celebrations. Clowns—principally the “whiteface” comic figures typically found…

Churches—Churches figure in Halloween history not only as places of worship on ALL SAINTS’ DAY and ALL SOULS’ DAY, but also as much-frequented sites in…

Christmas—The most popular holiday in Western culture, celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ on December 25. Surprisingly, Christmas shares a number of factors in common…

Ch’ing Ming (also Qing Ming)— Chinese festival of the dead with some similarities to ALL SAINTS’ DAY and ALL SOULS’ DAY. Ch’ing Ming is the…

Changelings— One Irish belief was that FAIRIES occasionally kidnapped human children and replaced them with a fairy child; this was often performed on Halloween. A…