Halloween
UK /ˌha.ləˈwiːn/ · US /ˌhæ.ləˈwiːn/ proper noun
Forms Halloweens Hallowe'en Halloweven
- proper noun The eve of All Hallows' Day; October 31st; celebrated (mostly in English-speaking countries) by children going door-to-door in costume and soliciting candy with menaces. “They all get dressed up in scary costumes at Halloween.”
Synonyms
Etymology
From a Scots shortening of Allhalloweven, from Allhallowmas (the obsolete earlier name of All Saints' Day) + even (an archaic or poetic variant of eve; see also een).
For the American pronunciation with /ɑ/, compare the Southern English traditional dialect pronunciations fallow /ˈfɒ.lə/ and tallow /ˈtɒ.lə/.
Webster’s 1913
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “Halloween”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details