Why Do We Dress Up for Halloween?
"I had mind it was Halloween . . . the wee callans were at it already, rinning aboot wi' their fause-faces on and their bits o' turnip lanthrons in their haun."
– John Service, Thir Notandums (1890)
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| Irish Halloween Mask at the Horniman Museum, Ethan Doyle White, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. |
A Night for the Supernatural
Over time what we know as modern Halloween actually developed from traditions connected with Samhain, the seasonal festival that marked the end of harvest season and beginning of winter in Ireland, Scotland, and the Isle of Man. Samhain was and still is associated with a time when the boundaries between the everyday world and the supernatural were believed to be less certain. Stories told of spirits, fairies, and other beings travelling on autumn nights.
Exactly what people costumes wore during the earliest Samhain celebrations is difficult to know. Written records describing ancient celebrations are scarce, so many details often repeated today come from customs recorded centuries later.
What we do know is that disguises eventually became an important part of these autumn traditions and are still today.
Mummers and Guisers
Guisers
There are reports that by at least the 1500s, people in parts of Scotland were taking part in a custom known as guising. Guisers disguised themselves and travelled from house to house but instead of simply asking for something at the door, they often performed for the home owners. They might sing a song, recite a verse, tell a joke, or entertain the household before receiving food or another small reward. Similar traditions were found in Ireland.
Mummers
There were also mummers, that were costumed performers who appeared during seasonal celebrations throughout Britain and Ireland. It's important to not that Mumming was not, and is not to this day, limited to Halloween. Mummers could visit homes during Christmas and other festivals, sometimes wearing masks, unusual clothing, or animal disguises and performing songs, rhymes, or short plays.
It's safe to say that when it came to Halloween, these traditions of disguise and performance became particularly fitting for a night already filled with stories about spirits and mysterious visitors.
See photographs of children guising in South Uist in 1932, preserved in the Canna House collection and featured by the BBC. ( article, The scary Halloween costumes islanders wore 90 years ago)
When the Costume Was the Trick
Some disguises were considerably stranger than the Halloween costumes we know today, although every year there is one or two that come to the door that could put that claim to the test. In parts of southern Ireland, groups travelled from house to house with a Láir Bhán, or white mare. A person carried or wore a horse-like disguise while the group recited verses and asked the household for food.
Some say that the Láir Bhán is the idea behind the hobby horse that we know today as it was often a real skull of a horse on top of a stick being carried by these groups, it's unlikely the case. We do have Ancient Roman and Greek texts document that Agesilaus II, the King of Sparta, famously rode a hobby horse (a simple stick between his legs) to entertain his children.
Elsewhere, people's faces might be covered by masks, veils, paint, or soot. The purpose of these costumes was not necessarily to dress as a favourite character or something familiar, the important part was being disguised. That idea survives in the word guising itself: going out in a different guise.
Halloween Travels
During the nineteenth century, large numbers of Irish and Scottish immigrants brought Halloween customs with them to North America and this is when Halloween changed again. And by the early twentieth century, Halloween parties had become popular, and costumes became part of the fun. At the same time, children continued the older tradition of going from house to house for treats.
Trick or Treat
The familiar phrase “trick or treat” began appearing in Canadian newspapers during the 1920s first printed in Blackie Times newspaper in Blackie, Alberta. Over the following decades, door-to-door Halloween visits became increasingly focused around children, costumes, and sweets.
After the Second World War, trick-or-treating grew especially popular across North American suburbs and American children were using "trick or treat" as they knocked on doors as well.
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| Children in Halloween costumes, Little Smoky River Farm Industries settlement Alberta, Canada 1950s via Wikimedia Commons. |
From Disguises to Dress-Up
Today, Halloween costumes can be almost anything. Children might become dinosaurs, astronauts, princesses, pumpkins, cartoon characters, or creatures of their own invention. Adults dress up for parties, schools hold costume parades, and families often spend weeks deciding what everyone will wear. So while the costumes have changed enormously, but something about the tradition remains familiar.
For centuries, people have used Halloween as a night to become someone, or something, else. We still see a clever mask, a strange outfit, a mummer at the door, a child dressed as a ghost and share treats in appreciation of their efforts.
The disguises keep changing, but every October, we still put them on.
Looking for more fun Halloween facts? Check out, Why do we carve pumpkins at Halloween?
Samhain: A Story About Halloween is part of the Changing Traditions series, which explores the history, folklore, and evolving customs behind holidays and celebrations, helping young readers discover how traditions change over time. Find it at your favourite bookstore or library near you.
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