Nov. 1.] ALL SAINTS’ DAY.
Nov. 1.]
ALL SAINTS’ DAY.
This festival takes its origin from the conversion, in the seventh century, of the Pantheon at Rome into a Christian place of worship, and its dedication by Pope Boniface IV. to the Virgin and all the Martyrs. The anniversary of this event was at first celebrated on the 1st of May, but the day was subsequently altered to the 1st of November, which was thenceforth, under the designation of the feast of All Saints, set apart as a general commemoration in their honour. The festival has been retained by the Anglican Church—Book of Days, vol. ii. p. 529; See Soane’s Book of the Months, 1849, vol. ii. p. 235.
A writer in the Gent. Mag. 1783 (vol. liii. p. 578), thinks the custom prevailing among the Roman Catholics of lighting fires upon the hills on All Saints’ night, the Eve of All Souls, scarcely needs explaining, fire being, even among the Pagans, an emblem of immortality, and well calculated to typify the ascent of the soul to heaven.
A correspondent of the same periodical (1788, vol. lviii. p. 602) alludes to a custom observed in some parts of the kingdom among the Papists, of illuminating some of their grounds upon the eve of All Souls, by bearing round them straw, or other fit materials, kindled into a blaze. This ceremony is called a Tinley, said to represent an emblematical lighting of souls out of purgatory.