A European Halloween
Trick or treat.
Though Halloween may be a strictly American holiday, the USA has nothing on Europe when it comes to the scary stuff. Europe is, after all, the continent where vampires, werewolves and witches first showed their evil faces. Dracula is from Transylvania, Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are all from England, and let’s not even get started on the Brothers Grimm. And now even the American-style Halloween of costumes and parties and haunted houses is catching on in Europe. So here are some creepy European cities to spend your Halloween.
Edinburgh, Scotland
With its many ancient dark buildings and its crooked cobbled streets, Edinburgh provides the perfect atmosphere for Gothic horror. Edinburgh, like so many other cities, is also steeped in tales of bloody murder and torture, and you don’t have to wait until Halloween to experience it. Your first choice is to visit Edinburgh Castle, which is itself the site of centuries of drama. Your second choice is to let the guides at Auld Reekie Tours show you around. Here you’ll hear many horrible stories about the city’s dark doings of the past, like the famous story of local menial workers turned grave robbers turned murderers Burke and Hare. They also offer a special Halloween Ghost Hunt. If you want to explore Edinburgh’s dark underbelly, you can pay a visit to the the city’s famous Dungeons, covering 500 years of Edinburgh’s gory history on 11 actor led shows and two scary rides.
Paris, France
The City of Lights also has a dark side, and there are three chilling ways to experience it. The Paris Ghost Tour is a walking tour and pub crawl covering the satanic conspiracies of the 17th-19th centuries, the true Sweeney Todd of Paris and the Vampire of Paris, a real life serial killer and cannibal. You won’t need a tour guide to visit Père Lachaise Cemetery. Just buy yourself a map at the entrance and you can see the final resting places of such historical figures as Frederic Chopin, Oscar Wilde and of course the Lizard King himself, Jim Morrison. Unfortunately, there are still six feet of dirt between you and all these famous bones. But if you want to remove that barrier, just head to the famous Paris Catacombs, where you can come face to skull with over six million Parisians from centuries past. Here beneath the city in a maze of old tunnels left over from an ancient quarry, you’ll find chamber after chamber of bones arranged in the most artistic ways.
Prague, Czech Republic
Considered by some to be the most haunted city in Europe, Prague is home to the Golem and to the 15th century Old Jewish Cemetery, whose lack of space has led to centuries of bodies being buried atop other bodies until this tangled, crowded mass of graves is now covering up to 12 layers of the deceased. But Prague’s main Halloween attraction actually lies outside the city limits in the nearby town of Sedlec in the world-famous Sedlec Ossuary. A small Roman Catholic chapel, located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints, the ossuary traces its origins back to the 14th century when the Black Death when thousands of people were buried here. When the church was built in the middle of the cemetery, the lower chapel was piled high with the bones that had to be removed, and in 1870, František Rint, a woodcarver, was employed by the Schwarzenberg family to put the bone heaps into order. The macabre result includes four enormous bell-shaped mounds of bones in the corners of the chapel, an enormous chandelier of bones hanging from the center of the nave and garlands of skulls draping the vault. Don’t miss the Schwarzenberg coat-of-arms, and the signature of Rint, which are also both made of bones.
Palermo, Italy
While the Sicilian capital of Palermo doesn’t actually boast any real-life zombies, it does boast the Capuchin Catacombs (Catacombe dei Cappuccini). Here you’ll have the closest to a zombie experience as is possible as you walk past centuries-old monks and other Palermo citizens who have all been mummified and await your visit, standing up and in their Sunday best! The bodies were dehydrated, sometimes washed with vinegar and sometimes embalmed. Originally reserved for the monks, the catacombs became a very fashionable place to spend eternity, and families would fight for the best spots to be seen by future generations. In their wills, local luminaries would ask to be preserved in favorite outfits and even to have their clothes changed at regular intervals. There are thousands of mummies in different states of decay, stretching back over 500 years.
Copenhagen, Denmark
If you’d like your Halloween experience to be a little less authentic, Copenhagen’s Tivoli Gardens Amuseument Park is closer to the US model, presenting Halloween chills and thrills similar to Knott’s Berry Farm and Universal Studios. Surrounded by thousands of pumpkins, hay bales, spiders and scarecrows, you’re invited to experience such attractions as the Witches Circus, Thriller Mini-Disco and a daily Halloween parade. The action takes place between October 14 and 23. That’s when the park’s playful witches are waiting for you at The Old Mill in the Halloween Village, where they brew magic potions and sing witchy songs. Kids of all ages can carve their own jack-o-lanterns and thrill to the sight of Denmark’s largest pumpkin. This is also the site of the Danish Pumpkin Championship.
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