Re: Jack o Lantern

From: Joy McCann <jmmccann_at_sbcglobal.net_at_hypermail.org>
Date: Tue, 1 Nov 2005 00:20:46 -0800

But at what point did they start boiling all their food?

--J

On Oct 31, 2005, at 11:11 PM, Elena Dent wrote:

> The jack o' lantern, or
> carved-and-candle-filled-member-of-the-squash-family
> did indeed start as a carved rutabaga or turnip, pumpkins not being
> available before the New World was discovered.  HOWEVER... it is a
> good deal
> older than Christianity.  Lighting such a lantern on Hallowed Eve is
> probably a memory of an ancient custom of doing that with the skulls
> of the
> revered ancestors.  Whether this was to light the beloved spirits'
> way home
> for a visit at the turning of the year or a way of warding them off or
> perhaps using the ancestors' strength to protect the house from evil
> on a
> dangerous night is hard to say.  Maybe all of the above.
>
> The very ancient people of the British Isles (all of the isles) seem
> to have
> taken comfort from having their dead with them, under the house,
> hallowing
> the land, perhaps helping to prove the land was theirs by providing a
> link
> between the living and the land itself.  We, the children of
> immagrants,
> don't have the land in our bones the way they did.
>
> Just finished a very cool book called _Before Scotland_ which makes a
> compelling case for the author's statement that 'the ancient ones',
> there
> before the Celts arrived, were not displaced - five of the six
> genesets his
> collegues traced in the British Isles are related to the pre Celtic
> folk
> (based on common sequences taken from ancient bog bodies and modern
> humans)
> Only one harks from the Middle East, he felt that those were the
> folks who
> brought farming to the isles.
>
> Elena
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: OliveStarlightOrchestra_at_yahoogroups.com
> [mailto:OliveStarlightOrchestra_at_yahoogroups.com]On Behalf Of 7visions
> Sent: Monday, October 31, 2005 12:00 AM
> To: OliveStarlightOrchestra_at_yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [OliveStarlightOrchestra] Jack o Lantern
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> Isn't this interesting?
>
> jack-o'-lantern .
> Pronunciation: jæk-ê-læn-têrn
>
> Part of Speech: Noun
> Meaning: A lantern made from a hollowed pumpkin with openings
> representing
> eyes, nose, and mouth to make it look like a face-a symbol of
> Halloween.
> Notes: No, the symbol of Halloween in North America does not come
> from a
> heavy drinking but stingy Irishman by the name of Jack O'Lantern,
> though it
> is a fetching story. It is the reduction of an old phrase, "jack with
> a
> lantern," spelled in a peculiar way. It is currently used as a single
> noun,
> so the plural is jack-o'-lanterns.
> In Play: The custom of putting carved vegetables out on Halloween did
> originate with the Catholic Irish. The Irish once placed carved
> turnips and
> rutabagas with candles inside in their windows to ward off the dead
> souls
> they presumed wandered about on the eve of All Saints Day, so-called
> Hallow
> E'en "Holy Evening". They switched to pumpkins when they emigrated to
> America.
> Word History: Jack-with-a-lantern originally meant simply "man with a
> lantern" (jack, as in the phrase, "every man, jack of them"), and
> referred
> to night watchmen. Its structure is analogical with that of
> "will-o'-the-wisp", which originally meant only "a man named Will
> with a
> wisp (whiskbroom)". Both "will-o'-the-wisp" and "jack-o'-lantern"
> later were
> used to refer to what the Romans called ignis fatuus "crazy fire,"
> the pale
> mysterious fire of swamp gases burning over marshy areas.
> Will-o'-the-wisp
> was presumed to be a sprite carrying a wisp of a torch across the
> swamps.
> Jack-o'-lantern was assumed to be a man with a lantern.
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Received on 2005-11-01 00:21:55