Be happy, it's Samhain

by Diane

Oops, wrong one. (Their version of “Samhain” is an open source file integrity and host-based intrusion detection system for Unix and Linux. They also do Beltane, a web-based central management console for Samhain. Additionally, they do web design for themselves and other people: see particularly Nightfall, a program which produces animations of eclipsing binary stars. Asimov would chuckle…)

…You pronounce it, more or less, “SOW’unn.” This, with Beltane, is one of the two great hinge-point feasts of the old Celtic quarterly calendar: the beginning of winter, in Irish tradition (in the same tradition, summer starts on May 1st with Beltane, which is why June 21 is so frequently called “Midsummer’s Day” over here). It was a time of “harvest home”, when the cows came back from pasture to be shedded (or slaughtered if, as was often the case, there wasn’t going to be enough stored hay or silage to keep them alive during the winter), and when the last of the crops and winter fuel were gotten in. Families that might have been scattered over much territory would reunite to take part in the work that had to be done if everyone was to live through the winter. After that there was time to thank the gods for the food people did have, and (on Oíche Shamhna itself, the eve of Samhain) to put out all the fires, kindling the first new fire of the New Year, and lighting great bonfires from it in defiance of the oncoming dark. (Completely understandable, since already around here it’s starting to get dark at 4:30 PM).

The name Hallowe’en is a much later addition, referring to the Church holiday which was superimposed on the old calendar feast: but the traditions surrounding both remain much the same. All Hallows’ Eve (the day and especially the night before All Saints’ Day, November 1) was held to be one of those nights on which the walls between the worlds got thin, and things both good and bad were more able than usual to slip through.

Whether your day involves pumpkins or the lighting of the first new fire…enjoy the day, and the night: remembering that no night lasts forever, except the very last one…and we’re nowhere near that one yet. (At any rate, to refute it, I plan to hum the Big Hum today. Better to light a candle…)

Oh, and check out the Google logo today.

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