Halloween History
The word Halloween is a shortened form of this name for the evening before All Saints’ Day.
All Hallows’ Eve.
This American author wrote The Raven and The Tell-Tale Heart.
Edgar Allan Poe.
This director made Psycho, Rear Window and Vertigo.
Alfred Hitchcock.
Arthur Conan Doyle gave Sherlock Holmes this doctor as his friend and chronicler.
Dr John Watson.
The original Oktoberfest was held in this Bavarian city.
Munich.
This term for a misleading clue in a mystery is also the name of a smoked fish.
Red herring.
Before pumpkins became common lanterns in North America, Irish Halloween traditions often used this root vegetable.
Turnip. Accept swede or rutabaga.
This author wrote Frankenstein while still a teenager.
Mary Shelley.
This actor played Norman Bates in the original Psycho.
Anthony Perkins.
This Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie relies on his “little grey cells.”
Hercule Poirot.
The Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival is associated with these round pastries, often filled with lotus seed paste.
Mooncakes.
To “glean” originally meant to collect these leftovers from a field after the harvest.
Leftover crops or grain.
The Mexican celebration Día de los Muertos is known in English by this name.
Day of the Dead.
This Irish author created Count Dracula in his 1897 novel.
Bram Stoker.
This actor played the monster in the 1931 film Frankenstein.
Boris Karloff.
A murder aboard this famous train brings Poirot into one of his best-known cases.
The Orient Express.
This French wine region gives its name to a famous sparkling wine.
Champagne.
From Latin words meaning “equal night,” this word names the event when the Sun crosses the celestial equator.
Equinox.
Orson Welles’ 1938 Halloween-eve radio drama about a Martian invasion was adapted from a novel by this British author.
H. G. Wells.
This ancient Celtic festival marking the transition into winter helped shape Halloween traditions.
Samhain. Pronounced roughly “SOW-in,” with “sow” rhyming with “cow.”
This Scottish author wrote Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
Robert Louis Stevenson.
James Stewart plays an injured photographer who watches his neighbours from his apartment in this 1954 thriller.
Rear Window.
This elderly amateur detective created by Agatha Christie lives in St Mary Mead.
Miss Jane Marple.
This Greek goddess of agriculture and grain was the mother of Persephone.
Demeter.
This word describes someone or something that signals the arrival of something else, as falling leaves might signal winter.
Harbinger.
In Scottish Halloween traditions, children dress in disguise and perform for treats. What is this custom called?
Guising.
This author of Rebecca also wrote the short story that inspired Hitchcock’s The Birds.
Daphne du Maurier.
In this 1944 film, starring Ingrid Bergman and Charles Boyer, a husband tries to make his wife doubt her sanity.
Gaslight.
This British author created Lord Peter Wimsey, the aristocratic amateur detective.
Dorothy L. Sayers.
Oktoberfest began with an 1810 royal wedding involving Prince Ludwig and this princess, whose name survives in “Theresienwiese.”
Princess Therese.
This adjective describes animals most active at dawn and dusk.
Crepuscular.