| By far and away the most popular use of masks | | | | wives and husbands revealed to them. |
| today, loosely but definitely within the drama arena, | | | | Ireland is quoted as being the origin of the modern |
| is for the annual ritual of Halloween, and most of all | | | | secular or pagan feast and Irish emigrants for taking |
| within the US. | | | | their superstitions with them to the US. |
| The evening of the 31st October has long been | | | | Modern popularity will have been greatly boosted by |
| celebrated in Church circles as the eve of All Saints' | | | | the Halloween series of horror movies, where a mask |
| Day and is properly known as All-hallow-even. | | | | is used to conceal the identity of the very scary killer. |
| Originally, in pre-Christian Britain, this was New year's | | | | Today popular masks for Halloween include the |
| Eve. Basically it's a Vigil for the morrow's Feast | | | | Slipknot range, Homer Simpson masks and gorilla |
| commemorating all the saints and martyrs, who | | | | masks. The Slipknot masks, created by the heavy |
| originally had no specific public recognition in the form | | | | metal band of that name, rely on a wide range of |
| of their own feast day, and was finally instituted in | | | | influences, not least S&M, as well as maggots, |
| its current form in the 9th century. Subsequently the | | | | clowns and skulls. |
| 2nd November was dedicated to all the other holy | | | | The lead characters in the popular adult US cartoon |
| souls who have made it to Heaven, but not been | | | | series have all spawned commercially-available masks, |
| canonised as saints - All Souls Day. | | | | with Homer Simpson's mask in particular rating high in |
| All-hallow-even or All Hallows Eve became in addition | | | | demand. |
| the secularised Halloween, deriving from its Celtic and | | | | Gorilla masks likewise rate highly for Halloween, joined |
| Gaelic roots in Britain. This now includes a tradition | | | | by all sorts of other devilish creatures such as |
| permitting children a chance to "trick or treat" - to | | | | hell-hounds, werewolves, bats, sharks, and dangerous |
| visit houses, carrying a jack-o-lantern (a pumpkin | | | | or even mutant beasts of every kind. |
| carved to resemble a diabolical face and having a lit | | | | As with so many Christian feasts deriving from earlier |
| candle within it), to demand a treat. If the treat is | | | | pagan celebrations, there sometimes seems to be a |
| not forthcoming, tradition allows the children to play a | | | | vast gulf between the Christian devotion on the one |
| trick on the householder. | | | | hand and the modern version of the pagan ritual on |
| In Scotland Halloween acquired a special significance | | | | the other. If there is a link, I can't help feeling it lies in |
| partly due to the poem of that name by Robert | | | | the common cause of trying to put the fear of God |
| Burns. Young lads and lasses, who observe certain | | | | into us (come Hell or High Water, probably the |
| rites, are supposed on this night to have their future | | | | former!). |