Ancient turnip jack o lantern1/3/2024 ![]() In a jack-o-lantern, the top of the pumpkin or turnip is cut off to form a lid, the inside. In the next section, we'll look at another popular Halloween food tradition: bobbing for apples. A jack-o-lantern (or jack olantern) is a carved pumpkin or turnip lantern, associated with the holiday of Halloween and named after the phenomenon of a strange light flickering over peat bogs, called will-o-the-wisp or jack-o-lantern. People began to cut frightening faces and other elaborate designs into their jack-o'-lanterns. As it turns out, pumpkins were easier to carve than turnips. Irish families who emigrated to America brought the tradition with them, but they replaced the turnips with the more plentiful pumpkins. ![]() Folk tradition held that they would ward off Stingy Jack and other spirits on Halloween, and they also served as representations of the souls of the dead. Traditional jack-o'-lanterns, hollowed-out turnips with embers or candles inside, became a very popular Halloween decoration in Ireland and Scotland a few hundred years ago. According to the Irish legend, you might see Jack's spirit on All Hallows' Eve, still carrying his turnip lantern through the darkness. I can only imagine how excited they must have been, that first Autumn in the New World, when they found a big veggie. We dont really have pumpkins here, so we made our lanterns from turnips up until a few years ago when supermarkets started getting pumpkins in at Halloween. Jack placed the ember in a hollowed-out turnip and wandered off into the world. Werent ancient jack-O-lanterns made from turnips or something. As Jack left the gates of Hell, the Devil threw him a hot ember to light the way in the dark. He was cursed to travel forever as a spirit in limbo. But, in keeping with their agreement, the Devil wouldn't take Jack either. ![]() When Jack eventually died, he was turned away from Heaven, due to his life of sin. ![]()
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