The History Behind Our Favorite Halloween Traditions

6 Halloween Customs That Originated With the Ancient Celts

Erik Devaney
13 min readOct 1, 2021

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photo of a lantern in a spooky scene
photo by Marko Blažević on Unsplash

The ancient Celts have a near-monopoly on things that go bump in the night. Werewolves. The Headless Horseman. Dracula. Yes, there are cases to be made that all of these monsters have their roots in Celtic mythology. And really, it’s not that surprising.

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Erik Devaney

Full-time stay-at-home dad, part-time ghostwriter, retired pub musician, recovering marketer