- Halloween, originally known as Samhain (pronounced sow-un), was a pagan holiday celebrated by the Celts across most of Western Europe and the British Isles. It was, in a nutshell, the pagan equivalent of New Year's Eve and Dio de los Meurtos all wrapped into one. When Christianity arrived, the holiday fell by the wayside and was taken over by a Christianized version (All Saints and All Souls Day(s). However it managed to survive on in a few outposts, most notably Ireland.
- Pre-potato famine, the Irish carved jack o'lanterns out of Swedish Turnips (AKA rutabagas). These little fellows were used to ward off the bad spirits that were thought to walk during this time of the year. Between you and I, carving a rutabaga sounds like a shitload of work. These relatives of the turnip are a) notoriously tough little buggers b) not hollow and c) completely devoid of yummy seeds.
- Post-famine, as droves of Irish made their way to the U.S. of A, they discovered the pumpkin which--for obvious reasons--was a hands-down favorite when it came to carving jack o'lanterns. Farewell rutabagas! Viva la pumpkin!
Which brings us to the present.
- Pre-potato famine, the Irish carved jack o'lanterns out of Swedish Turnips (AKA rutabagas). These little fellows were used to ward off the bad spirits that were thought to walk during this time of the year. Between you and I, carving a rutabaga sounds like a shitload of work. These relatives of the turnip are a) notoriously tough little buggers b) not hollow and c) completely devoid of yummy seeds.
- Post-famine, as droves of Irish made their way to the U.S. of A, they discovered the pumpkin which--for obvious reasons--was a hands-down favorite when it came to carving jack o'lanterns. Farewell rutabagas! Viva la pumpkin!
Which brings us to the present.
I don't know about you, but I've never actually seen a carved turnip. I admit to feeling somewhat curious. I mean clearly, pumpkins are my preferred canvas when it comes to vegetable carving (I do not recommend lettuce or cabbage). But I'm all for celebrating the past, etc.
Anyway, thanks to the internet...I found this:
And promptly scared the piss out of myself.
This is a rutabaga. It's on display in a museum somewhere in Ireland. I haven't a clue how old it is. But I will say it's incredibly disturbing to look at. It has teeth people. And it looks like a mummified head that was fished out of a bog. If this is the sort of shit the Irish were placing on windows and doorsteps to scare off evil spirits, I suspect it worked like a charm. It was probably also very useful when it came to scaring off neighbors, small children, and drunks.
Let's scroll up and take another look at our mummified friend up there. Now let's take a look at some American-style jack o' lanterns:
Slightly creepy? Sure! Nightmare inducing? Not really.
Happy Halloween folks! Avoid turnips.
When I was a kid, we couldn’t get pumpkins where we lived, so we used to make lanterns out of rutabaga.
ReplyDeleteI will admit I had no idea that that was their real name until reading this … we called them 'swedes' and again I never questioned why until today - you are educating this turnip carving simpleton in more than one ways with this posting Jen, kudos - anyway, these things are a BASTARD to carve.
Chopping off the top was pretty tricky, you needed a carving knife and a bread knife mixed with the strength of a lumberjack to get through the thing ... then came the hard work.
To hollow out the - essentially rock solid - center you needed to scratch deep holes into the surface and then go at it with a spoon, you may get through a centimeter or so at a time then back to it with a knife ... it was not unlike "Escape from Alcatraz"
I would love to post a photo of a glorious turnip I had carved in the past, but the truth is that most of our scary faces only had eyes - as we had given up long before we got down to the bottom of the thing, either that or my Mum would have hidden every spoon in the house so we could not bend another one … eating soup in our house in the '80's was a messy business ... spoons pointed in every direction other than the one they were supposed to point in.
Another horror was the smell of gently roasting turnip / less than gently charring turnip when you put a candle inside. Not having a great deal of space inside for a candle and a naked flame meant that the thing would burn from the inside out very quickly.
The final insult? Having to eat turnip for a fortnight.
When I first carved a pumpkin, I felt cheated.
I’m don't like the idea of genetically engineered food, but if they can make a swede with a hollow center, I know what I’m carving next year!
Philip...I had no idea folks in the British Isles were still carving turnips/rutabagas into the 70s and 80s! It sounds like a frigging pain in the ass. After I posted this last night, I was wondering about the whole candle thing. Even small-ish pumpkins can experience charring when a lit candle is placed inside...and a rutabaga is a LOT smaller than most small pumpkins...and inconveniently solid all the way through which means you have to carve out a space to fit the candle in. Sounds like a bitch. Kudos to our Celtic forfathers and mothers who had the tenacity to make it work.
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