Folklorists created a through line from the Celtic pagan festival of Samhain to Halloween. But the Halloween we know today has more to do with the English, a 9th century pope and American consumerism.

Irish pagans gathered at an ancient sacred site on Wednesday night to mark the festival of Samhain - a precursor of Halloween - with bonfires and a procession to honor the dead.

October 31 means it's Halloween! Wondering how the holiday got started and why we trick or treat for candy? Here's what to know about its past.

Costumed trick-or-treating takes its inspiration from the Celtic holiday Samhain —“summer’s end” in Irish—more than 2,000 years ago. Samhain marked New Year’s Day and fell around ...

To that question, we return to the evening before All Saints Day and Samhain, known as All Hallows Eve. As mentioned previously, the night was a time of new beginnings in Celtic tradition, and so too ...