historyWikipediaancient · Ireland and Britain
Jack-o'-lanterns began as carved turnips and skulls in Celtic and British Halloween customs
The jack-o'-lantern is thought to come from Ireland and Britain, where people carved vegetables long before pumpkins were common there. Some scholars link the custom to ancient Celtic head veneration, when severed heads were displayed for protection, and to the festival of Samhain, when people believed spirits walked the earth. In 19th-century England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland, people hollowed out turnips or mangel wurzels and carved grotesque faces into them to frighten spirits away or to ward them off from homes. Early written references to Jack-o'-lantern date to 1830s Irish and English newspapers, and the name likely comes from folk tales about a wandering figure called Jack.
A hollowed vegetable with a carved face and a candle inside glows through the openings. In older folk belief, the glow was thought to scare away evil spirits or guide wandering souls.
The jack-o'-lantern shows how a folk custom meant to repel spirits became the modern Halloween decoration. Pumpkins later replaced turnips after emigrants brought the custom to North America, where the larger, softer fruit was easier to carve.
Harvest-season and autumn festivals in many cultures used lights and carved faces to mark the boundary between the living and the dead. Halloween itself grew from these older customs and spread widely in the 20th century.
In parts of Britain and Ireland the earliest lanterns were carved from turnips, not pumpkins.
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Photo: Man vyi, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
