The Medieval History of Halloween: Soul Cakes, Guising and Turnips - the reason why nobody carved a pumpkin!

By Chris Livemore

I am going to start this blog by letting you know that there were no pumpkins in medieval Britain. Not a single one.

Pumpkins came from the Americas and only reached Europe after the medieval period in the 16th century. They were first mentioned by Elizabethan herbalist John Gerard in 1597, so we know pumpkins, or 'pompions' as they were known back then, were grown in Tudor gardens, but missed the Middle Ages.

So whatever people were doing at the end of October, it certainly wasn’t carving a pumpkin and sticking a candle inside (or as my children wanted to paint a pumpkin white, stick a unicorn and googly eyes on it and make it into a unicorn with rainbow sparkles!).

They had other ways of keeping busy, cakes, singing, dressing up to hide from the spirits and frightening the neighbours with vegetables.

Three days, not one

Medieval Halloween wasn’t just one night. All Hallows’ Eve (31 October) was followed by All Saints’ Day (1 November) and All Souls’ Day (2 November). Together, these became known as Hallowtide - imagine dealing with three nights of trick-or-treating!

All Saints honoured the saints, while All Souls was devoted to praying for the dead. The latter became established across much of medieval Europe following reforms associated with Abbot Odilo of Cluny around AD 1000.

Behind it was the belief in purgatory, where souls were purified before entering heaven. Prayers offered by the living were believed to help ease their suffering. Church services, prayers and commemorations of the dead were therefore important parts of Hallowtide.

The night the bells rang

On All Hallows’ Eve, parish churches rang their bells through the night to comfort souls in purgatory and keep wandering spirits at bay. Picture it in a world with no streetlights, no electricity and a firm belief that the dead were close. The practice was discouraged after the Reformation, though it lingered in places.

Souling: the original trick-or-treating?

In medieval England, poorer people (and later children) could visit wealthier households asking for food or charity in return for prayers for the dead. The custom became known as souling, and the treats they received were called soul cakes.

These were often small, sweet or spiced cakes, in some places made with oats. Later recipes included dried fruit and spices such as cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. Often they were marked with a cross.

In return for a cake (or technically a biscuit), the recipient promised to pray for the souls of the household’s deceased friends and relatives.

Not a bad arrangement. You received something to eat, the household received prayers for its departed loved ones, and everyone believed they were helping souls reach heaven and escape from purgatory.

The tradition was believed to have originated in the 12th century, but was first documented around 1400, when the English cleric John Mirk referred to an already established custom of distributing bread for the dead at All Hallows. Souling continued for centuries, particularly in parts of northern and western England. By the nineteenth century, children were still going from door to door singing for cakes.

Sound familiar?

Guising: dressing up for your supper

Another ancestor of trick-or-treating was guising, particularly associated with Scotland and Ireland.

People disguised themselves and visited houses, performing songs, poems or jokes in return for food or money. You really had to earn your reward in the Middle Ages. This was especially the case as the disguises were worn to hide from malevolent spirits who had a nasty habit of turning up and wandering around looking for mischief on All Hallows' Eve.

Simply turning up dressed as a ghost with a carrier bag wasn’t going to cut it.

Medieval people certainly enjoyed costumes, disguises and mumming, although the evidence for Halloween guising in its familiar form comes from later centuries. Over time, customs involving costumes, performances and door-to-door visits helped shape the Halloween traditions we see today.

The almighty turnip

Before pumpkins became Halloween’s favourite vegetable, people in Britain and Ireland carved lanterns from turnips and other root vegetables. And if you’ve ever tried hollowing out a turnip, you’ll know exactly why pumpkins eventually won.

The turnip is essentially a small, stubborn boulder masquerading as food.

The practive originated from a folk tale about a man named Jack who after trying to trick the devil became unwanted in both heaven and hell. As the legend goes Jack was condemed to roam the earth with only a burning coal, inside a hollowed-out turnip, to light the way. This was the original Jack-o'-lantern.

When Irish immigrants brought their Halloween customs to North America, pumpkins proved a much better choice for carving. Larger, softer and considerably less likely to require a blacksmith or heavy duty machinery.

One wonderful British lantern tradition survives in Somerset. Every October, children in Hinton St George celebrate Punkie Night, parading through the village carrying lanterns carved from mangelwurzels. Yes, mangelwurzels. If you don't know what a mangelwurzel is then a quick Google will show that this is a vegetable that has recently gone viral - yes it is a strange world we are living in. Some traditions are simply too good to abandon.

Bonfires, black sows and wandering spirits

Halloween wasn’t all cakes and vegetables. In Wales, Calan Gaeaf marked the beginning of winter, and later folklore warned of a terrifying creature called Yr Hwch Ddu Gwta, the tailless black sow. According to tradition, children fled from the bonfire, fearful of being caught by this supernatural pig.

It makes today’s plastic skeletons seem rather tame in comparison! Bonfires, fortune-telling and tales of wandering spirits also became associated with Halloween in parts of Britain and Ireland, although their precise origins and ages are difficult to establish, let's just say it was in Medieval Britain.

Was Halloween originally Celtic?

You’ll often hear that Halloween comes directly from the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain. The truth is a little less straightforward. Samhain was an important seasonal festival in Gaelic Ireland, associated with the beginning of winter. Much of our early written evidence comes from medieval Irish literature. Meanwhile, the Christian festivals of All Saints and All Souls developed their own traditions of remembrance and prayer.

How these customs influenced one another remains debated. Modern Halloween grew from several traditions rather than one simple origin story. One thing is certain, long before pumpkins, plastic fangs, unicorns and supermarket buckets of sweets, people were marking the end of October with food, remembrance, disguises and stories about things lurking in the darkness.

So when a small ghost knocks on your door this Halloween, spare a thought for the medieval souler.

They offered prayers for the dead in return for a cake. Today, we hand over chocolate to someone wearing a bedsheet. And we’re lucky if we get a thank you.

Join the Shield Wall at thegoodknightbook.com/shield-wall for medieval history, dad reading tips and the occasional turnip that deserved better.