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Irish Halloween Traditions | Gifts of Fortune Telling
Irene Hislop
Samhain isn’t just about the Halloween traditions popular in North America. It’s the eve of the Celtic new year. The Irish traditionally believed a veil separated this world and the world of spirits, and this veil gets worn and grows thinner and more porous as the year goes on. So the last night of the year – Samhain / Halloween – is when that veil is weakest and spirits from beyond can visit. Our modern Irish Halloween traditions of trick or treating and carving pumpkins are rooted in our ancestors’ strategies to appease and confuse the terrifying spirits they believed roamed among them on that night.
But the new year wasn’t all terror and dread. With the crop harvested and the days growing shorter, people gathered inside and wondered what the new year ahead would hold for them.
Barmbrack
You’ll see barmbrack in every Irish grocery store and bakery throughout the month of October. You might even see them in shops around the world that sell Irish gifts. Barmbrack is a round, dense fruit cake – although it is much less dense and less sweet than the fruit cakes sold in the USA. Traditionally, these were made at home and various symbols would be added to the mix to foretell what lay ahead for the person who got the token in their slice. For example, a ring predicted a marriage and a coin prosperity. Not everything was a good omen, however. A bit of rag meant poverty.
Another way fortunes were told with small objects was to put them in saucers instead of barmbrack. People were blindfolded and then they reached out and the item in whichever saucer they touched first told their fortune. The same items were used in both this and barmbrack.
Is there a wedding in your future?
Apple Peels
Young single ladies would peel apples for baking together. It might be a group of sisters or cousins or friends. But they developed a bit of a fortune telling game with the peels. The idea was to peel as long a strip as you could and let it drop to the table or floor. Then the group would try to see what letter the strip of peel resembled, and that would be initial of the future spouse of the girl who peeled it. With so much scope for manipulation, this must have stirred up a lot of excitement and laughter – and maybe even a bit of rivalry.
Another Irish Halloween apple activity was a game called snap apple. An apple is hung from a string, and the players’ hands are tied behind their backs. One by one, they are led to the apple for one chance to take a bite of it. The one who succeeds first is the next one to be married, or in a lower stakes version, they simply get to enjoy the apple. A higher stakes version involves candles.
Traditional Ogham Gifts
In an age of endless digital entertainment, games and dating apps, these pastimes might seem very simple. But they reveal something about us. People everywhere are concerned about love and what their future holds. We might not have fortune telling games linked to New Year’s Eve, but just like the ancient Irish, on the dawn of a new year we want to know how our hearts will fare. New Year’s Eve is one of the popular days to propose for the very same reason our ancestors used their new year’s eve to try to predict who would marry in the coming year.
